After cross-examining every scenario and situation that was possible, I ended up getting on one of those state department flights offered a week or so later than the first batch. I had to sign a promissory note to the state department that I would pay them back. It was only a better idea in the long run. The US might be chaotic, but not so much in this southern city. I have some friends and family in case something goes wrong. I don’t know a soul in Guatemala and would like to take care of a few personal family matters before returning to Central Europe.
It worked. I am back in the town I went to high school and it sure is weird. I am currently “housesitting,” my recently deceased step grandfather’s house for the moment. I am grateful for the opportunity to have a place to be for the moment, especially a place to myself. I have it much better than many that have to “come home.”
Returning to the city that you went to high school in as a sort of lonely 31-year-old woman invokes a past version of yourself that you thought left behind 12-13 years ago. It feels a bit more topsy-turvey, adding quarantine to the loop. Also, the uncertainty about what is going to unfold with my professional and personal life plays a toll. Being nomadic in a pandemic is like playing a game of musical chairs, you are sort of stuck where the music stops. I wish this game would have waited another month, and then I would be comfortable living in this central European capital city. Sure, I would be quarantined, and there would be restrictions, but I would be closer to what I have become accustomed to in the last eight years.
I try to manage my time here by working as much as possible. I have also signed up for a GIS course. I plan to post lots of backlogged articles on my travels. I will hike as long as the local trails are still open. I hope to find some volunteering with some immigration advocacy group or a food bank if I find some time. It sounds productive, but I have days where I want to sulk all day, order take out, stay up late worrying, and long for the times that I was able to hop on whatever mode of transportation that I wanted. I miss being able to spend a month or two in some fantastic city, cheaply. I miss the time when I lived in, probably, what is my favorite city in the world for six years.
Yeah, I sound sulky and selfish. I get that this pandemic is severe. I am not about to act like these morons that think it is their fundamental right to go to some TGI Fridays and act like a dick to the waiter. I am not one of those that can’t go a few weeks without seeing a stylist. I still find the economic aspects depressing and the clampdown on movement even more so. It seems these days in the states, you are either fully supportive of every restriction or one of these idiots that I was just describing.
So tune in next time to hear about how I am surviving the south or to read one of my overdue articles about the Balkans or Caucuses 🙂
