A week ago, I decided to return to the states. I had lost my sense of direction and my plans had been ripped to shreds. Every step I took sank me deeper into a puddle of mud that I couldn’t escape from. I expected to confront a myriad of challenges on my journey, but then the rules changed. There was nothing that I could have done that would have prepared me for COVID.
The daily stress that COVID brings is a heavy burden for us all. I was attempting to make sense of this surreal world in a foreign country, living in a stranger’s home, with no one to talk to, and thousands of miles separating me from my closest friends and family. Doubts formed in my mind like a dark storm front threatening a clear blue horizon. I couldn’t help but think that I was choosing to carry unnecessary burdens until my knees began to buckle under the weight of the consequences. I needed to let go of my baggage.
The unfortunate truth of my journey is almost too painful for me to write. I spent 18 months preparing to let go of the only home that I have ever known, taking the time to bid farewell to friends, family, coworkers, and my community. I intentionally removed the familiarity in my life to open up more space for curiosity and immersion in new cultures. I came to terms with the idea that I could be leaving Evanston for good.
Then over the first three weeks of quarantine in France, I felt a dearth of familiarity, comfort, and love, and I realized that those were the same feelings that I had chosen to sacrifice in my quest to fully embrace life in a new country. The loss of those feelings was only intensified by the mood of estrangement, grief, and uncertainty that COVID brought with it. With no opportunity to build a new community in France and strengthen that emotional structure to balance the effects of COVID, I was exacerbating the problem.
I fought to build myself back up and regain my balance. I scrapped the original plans for my trip and drew up a new itinerary and budget. Then when government restrictions around the world tightened, I extended my timeline to account for the changes. I felt like if I was clever and flexible enough then I could stay one step ahead of the virus and save my trip. Then it got worse. New cases rose exponentially and death tolls rose at an alarming rate. More countries closed their borders, and enacted fines and threatened jail time for breaking the quarantine. Now, when I daydreamed about gallivanting around Europe, the only thing I could picture was being cooped up in another stranger’s apartment for months on end. My trip was no longer about curiosity or cultural immersion, it was about survival. I began to sheepishly confront the very nature of my trip, “Do I really have the audacity to travel during the most difficult time to travel in modern history?”
With this loaded question in mind, I cautiously allowed the flow of difficult subjects to come to mind, and over time, as I became more comfortable accepting each topic, negotiating with myself lost its hostility. With my newfound leverage, I boiled the decision down to two questions, “How do I feel when I imagine myself staying in France? How do I feel when I imagine myself leaving France?”
I wrote the questions in my journal to feel my gut reaction. I meditated on the questions to see how they resonated in a silent space. I brought the questions to my yoga mat to see how my body responded after working off my anxious energy. I brought the questions to my friends and family to listen to their feelings and reactions. I was met with warmth and encouragement to forge my own path.
Then a close friend of mine helped me frame the question differently, “What if the learning opportunity here is to cease fighting the unwinnable battle. To acknowledge my accomplishments along with my limits. To concede the trip as it stands in hopes of returning stronger and more prepared to continue the journey another time. What if the true growth of this trip is letting go?” With a new purpose beckoning me toward the finish line, I brought the questions on a walk and into nature.
I found my spot on the edge of a rock, overlooking a vast expanse of crops, and I connected to the world around me. I felt the warmth of the sun shining bright overhead and casting light onto the fields below. The wind kicked up and sent gusts across the top of the valley and the blades of grass flowed like waves in the ocean. I felt a sharp chill as the wind blew through me and emptied out my heavy thoughts, like opening the windows on that first warm spring day. With that space, my mind brought me back to my place of comfort, sitting on the edge of a rock on the shores of Lake Michigan.
I brought up each question one by one. As I imagined staying in France I felt a wave of tension consume my body. My shoulders and neck locked up and nausea came over me. I couldn’t live another day with that feeling. As I imagined going home, a lightness entered my heart as if the idea had lifted a great burden from my chest. I felt an undeniable and cathartic wave of relief.
And in that calm moment of harmony, I heard faint lyrics from a distant place. “Home, is where I want to be, but I guess I’m already there. I come home she lifted up her wings, guess that this must be the place.” My decision brought me peace.
I booked my flight home later that day, thanked my host family for their undying hospitality in the face of uncertain circumstances, and left France two days later. What followed was both the smoothest travel experience I have ever had and the most stressful.
Charles de Gaulle airport was empty by its typically teeming standards yet small clouds of chaos swirled around the building. A large family congregated around one check-in gate, desperate for answers and for their ordeal to end. Backpackers gathered for a cigarette outside of the airport, without a home to return to. Staff people waited nervously, at arms distance, prepared to give the news that no one wanted to hear. I cautiously navigated this maze and quickly found my gate. Designed in a hexagonal layout with gates in each direction, only the gate for my flight to Montreal was in use for that day. In that space fashioned for hundreds of passengers, twenty people sat patiently as they awaited our flight. I felt relieved by the emptiness.
On the plane, we were seated far away from other passengers and the interactions with cabin crew were limited. I felt safe in my personal space and trusted that people would maintain the social distancing that I had become accustomed to. Unfortunately, not everyone was as disciplined as I expected. A pair of children spent the flight using the cabin as their own playground climbing in and out of chairs and hopping between aisles. At one point in the flight, the father picked up the rambunctious child and sat directly in front of me. Had there not been 55 other rows to choose from I would have been gracious with my space. However, under these circumstances, the plane was flying at 6% capacity. Find another place to sit my dude.
Sadly, the children were not the worst part of my traveling experience. That wretched number one spot is awarded to using the bathroom (and every other movement that forced me to interact with my surroundings). Entering these flying cesspools was a living hell but it needed to be done. Let me walk you through the 19 step clusterf**k that was going to the bathroom on an airplane during the Coronavirus Pandemic of 2020:
- Sanitize my hands and put on gloves
- Adjust my mask and exit my seat
- Walk to the bathroom and lock the door with my gloved hand
- Lift the toilet seat up with my foot
- Dispose of my gloves
- Pee
- Use a paper towel to flush the toilet
- Dispose of the paper towel
- Close the toilet seat with my foot
- Use a paper towel to turn on the faucet
- Wash my hands for a good minute or two
- Rinse and dry my hands
- Dispose of the paper towel
- Use a paper towel to open the door
- Dispose of the paper towel
- Walk back to my seat
- Sanitize my hands and put on gloves
- Breathe a sigh of relief
- Repeat as necessary
- Too neurotic? I think not.
When I reached Montreal, I went through customs and explored the nothingness of the US connections terminal at Montreal Trudeau Airport. I counted a total of 15 people spread across 16 gates. Out of the 16 flights scheduled for the day, 13 had been canceled. Thankfully, my flight to O’Hare was still scheduled for an on-time departure. Although my travel experience was going smoothly, I overheard stories of travel hell. One person was attempting to make his way from Tel Aviv to Minneapolis and was on his fourth flight of the day. Flights were being canceled left and right because of a lack of passengers. The people who had booked the flights were left with few options, the best of which was connecting to another airport in hopes of finding a flight carrying enough passengers to their final destination. I imagined someone starting in Tel Aviv and making their way to Istanbul, connecting to Paris, traveling to Montreal, flying to Chicago, hopping over to Minneapolis, and renting a car to drive 10 hours home. I had run out of synonyms for flying and I felt overwhelmingly grateful for my own experience.
My flight from Montreal to Chicago had six people on it. I didn’t dare test the bathroom this time. I indulged in Nutella crepes that I had packed the day before and finished “My Neighbor Totoro” on my Kindle. Just the escape that I needed, and the flight went without a hitch. From the time the plane touched down at O’Hare to the moment I walked through the storm door of my parent’s house in Evanston a little over an hour had passed. I immediately stripped off my clothes and jumped in the shower. After 20 hours of wearing a mask, not touching my face, sanitizing my hands after every movement, and avoiding all human contact, I had made it home. I took the most meaningful shower I have ever taken.
It is day nine of my self-isolation. If you add my time in French confinement, I have been in quarantine for over four weeks. I feel healthy with no symptoms, and I hope the worst is behind me. Being home feels much different than France. Practically speaking things are worse than before. I can’t go on walks, and I am stuck in my parent’s basement for two weeks. I have zero physical contact with my family even though they are mere feet away from me, separated by a ceiling, at any given moment. I don’t have unlimited access to crepes, quiche, or croissants. But what I do have can’t be defined by practicality. I am surrounded by the love and support of family and friends. The weight of finding a home in Europe to wait out the storm has been lifted off my shoulders. I am in a familiar place, and in this time of doubt comfort is the perfect antidote for uncertainty.
Maybe I will learn something from this crisis. Right now, I can barely think past tomorrow. The best advice I received before my trip was from my cousin. She told me that my journey would be difficult and that the growth would be limitless, but that it wouldn't happen overnight. It will take time, sometimes years, to make sense of the personal change that I am experiencing today. With that in mind, I am taking the time to gather up every restorative tool that I can to balance out the fear, grief, and uncertainty that I feel every day. In time, that may give me permission to explore each troubling feeling to find meaning in all of this. Or it won’t, and I will have spent this time surrounding myself with love and joy. Either outcome sounds pretty good to me.
