flipflop_diva

It looks like an obstacle course. Orange cones as far as the eye can see, across what is normally a parking lot full of minor league baseball fans.

But today, it’s a test in driving ability. Be sure to stay between the lines made of cones. Don’t knock any over. Don’t turn the wrong way.

It’s probably best just to follow the line of cars in front of you and hope you keep up with them.

The first actual obstacle is a man with a clipboard and a friendly smile. He asks how many (“Two,” we say). He asks if we’re feeling sick or if we’ve been sick in the past two weeks (“No,” we say). Satisfied with our answers, he scrawls a large number on our windshield with a blue pen and sends us on our way.

The second obstacle is another man, but this one is holding a tablet. He asks for names and birthdates and reference numbers. He inputs all the information into his tablet and frowns at it for a few seconds. But then he looks up. Under his mask, he might be smiling. We can’t tell. But he puts a circle around the number on our windshield and sends us on our way to navigate more orange cones.

This time there are no other cars in front of us. They all seem to have disappeared somehow. The cones also appear closer together. For a moment, we wonder if we will be trapped in this cone maze forever.

But finally, after we’ve been winding through them for what seems like an eternity, we see a beacon of hope. This time, it’s a man in an orange vest waving us on. We keep going, now with the confidence that we are indeed going the right way.

We pass a few more people in orange vests, until finally we come upon a woman who waves us into a line behind five other cars. We pull up, close as we can get, and then look at each other as we prepare to wait.

It’s been a long time coming. But we’re almost there.

--

It’s taken more than two months to get this far. Somewhere around the beginning of the year, Texas announced that vaccine signups were open for Phase 1B. In Texas, that includes people below the age of 65 with at least one chronic health condition. Fortunately, for me, pregnancy counts as one of those conditions. For my husband, who has diabetes, that also counts.

I wait a couple weeks for my next OB appointment after the announcement of who can qualify. Then I ask my doctor her thoughts.

“If I were pregnant, I would get it,” she says. “But it’s up to you.”

“Oh, I want it if I can get it,” I say. I’ve thought from the beginning I would much rather risk a few side effects from a vaccine than side effects from having COVID.

My OB agrees that this is a wise decision.

That night, then a couple weeks into January, David and I sign up for the waiting list for the largest vaccine provider in our county. It tells us we are numbers forty-eight thousand and something in line. It also tells us they are doing about eight thousand vaccinations a week. We calculate that maybe in six weeks, we can get a shot.

But a couple weeks later, our county combines all waiting lists in our area into one. The email alert telling us this doesn’t tell us what number we now are.

A couple weeks after that, an ice storm hits. Vaccine appointments for the entire week are cancelled, putting everything even more behind.

We decide we need to be more pro-active. So we begin a ritual. We find a list of other places offering appointments — H.E.B. (the largest grocery store chain in Texas), Walgreens, CVS. Then, every morning and every night, we get on our phones and pull up the vaccine appointment sites and refresh and refresh and refresh, just hoping to get an elusive spot. Most of the time, by the time we click a link, it’s too late.

One time I get to select a date but by the time I go to click a time, all slots are full.

It’s harder than winning the lottery.

It feels futile. We wonder if we’ll ever get a vaccine or if we are doomed to live the life of lockdown forever.

One night, almost two weeks into March, we perform our nightly vaccine appointment search ritual. I give up first, having no luck. I decide to check emails instead.

And there, in my email, shining like an angel’s halo, are the words: “Williamson County COVID Vaccination Appointment.”

My heart starts beating wildly. Could this really be what I think it is? I click on the message and quickly read through it.

It is what we’ve been waiting for! An invitation to register for an appointment.

I tell David to hurry, to check his email now. He does. He has an invitation too.

We enter the appointment site, pick one out for each of us between 3:30 and 4 p.m. the next day at Dell Diamond, normally used for baseball games but not lately. We fill in all the info — names and address and phone number, health history, insurance info — but eventually, it comes to an end. We click submit and get the instructions for the next day.

There is finally a light at the end of the very, very long tunnel.

--

The line of cars moves fast once we are actually in the place to get our shots. We pull up between two long, narrow tables when it’s our turn. A nurse comes up to David on his side of the car, and another comes up to me on my side.

We give them all of our information again, and then the time has come.

I barely feel the needle as it goes in, but I can’t help grinning in excitement. The nurse carefully puts on a bandage after she removes the syringe, and then she hands me a card.

My very own vaccination card.

We are directed to drive through more cones, with more twists and turns, to the observation area. There we sit in the car for fifteen minutes until the workers deem us safe from side effects.

We make our second appointment while we wait.

Finally, we are given the all clear, and we head home, hoping against hope we don’t have any side effects but happier than we’ve ever been in our lives to get a shot.

Non-fiction. I'm happy to report we got our second vaccine yesterday! And so far, the only side effects are a really, really sore arm and a bit more tired than normal (although maybe it's just normal tired. So hard to say these days!) So in two weeks, we'll be ready to hug other vaccinated people. Yay!

Thank you for reading! This was written for

therealljidol: Survivor Idol! We're at the final immunity challenge, so there's no voting. We now are writing two entries every day until only one person is left standing.

That said, if you want to read the entries, you can find them all here.