But, But, But Can We Travel?
Life’s a COVID Guessing Game
Well, should we?
I keep hearing about people getting COVID while traveling, but everyone is still traveling even while asking the same question over and over. Should we travel or not?
Is everyone destined to get COVID no matter what we do?
You only live once. These questions are tormenting us. I mean Fauci got COVID. Now Biden has COVID on the rebound. What the hell!
Not only are most people destined to get COVID, but most likely they’ll get it more than once.
We’re collectively struggling with our new reality, however. We keep hoping it’ll morph into something that resembles our old reality, but it may not. As we struggle to figure out how to do the things we’ve always done, the dilemma is forcing many of us to question whether returning to what’s familiar is a sensible goal, on many levels.
So, we continually ponder possible outcomes, consider taking more risks, and ask ourselves whether we can stop worrying even as the following is the most likely scenario for the foreseeable COVID future.
- How it effects each person will remain unpredictable, so it will always be a risk.
- What to expect from each new variant will continue to be a worry.
- What the long-term effects will be are still unknown.
- Vaccines will continue to be updated
- People will keep passing it to their friends and relatives
- The next phase will be learning to deal with long COVID
People will continue to travel, however.
Unless a person is from a poor country where most never got to travel in the first place, the rest of the world will hop on a train, plane or boat whenever they can find the time and money to do so. There has always been great inequity when it comes to travel privileges. A small portion of the world’s population contributes the lion’s share of aviation admissions. The rest of the world, whether they travel or not, must still bear the climate and COVID consequences. If we are to assume that moving around the world while carrying COVID will also guarantee the spread of variants, then I don’t see things improving any time soon.
Without flight safety protocol in place, no masking or testing required, the spread will be guaranteed.
I have a friend that just returned from Europe. He came down with COVID while abroad, then tested negative, flew home feeling like crap, only to test positive when he arrived stateside. He ended up with pneumonia and is still feeling lousy.
Another friend who’d never had COVID flew to see family, tested positive for COVID, isolated in her daughter’s guest bedroom, tested negative finally, flew home, and tested positive upon arrival. She was also very sick for several weeks and still has lingering symptoms.
Many will get sick — again.
Most will get COVID more than once. Soon, your annual COVID bout will be normalized. We won’t even be able to picture life pre COVID. Our new life will no longer seem strange in a world where the rules to the game have changed.
And then there’s long COVID which is already creating a challenge for our health care systems.
It’s added to the numbers who can no longer work as well. We face a future dilemma that remains unresolved and still not totally understood.
Yet, I don’t see travel slowing down again in the near future.
I’ve done a fair share of travel in my lifetime. Not since COVID, but I miss it. I understand what a joy it is to fly cross country to see loved ones or to take a flight to explore a new region of the world. I’m cautious, however. I hate cleaning up messes. I also have no desire to experience the American health care system up close and personal. It’s far too expensive for me to let down my guard and end up in the hospital.
So, I have limited my travel to an occasional short road trip for the last two and a half years.
While choosing to stay grounded, I’ve found myself wondering what it would be like if I never flew again. I’ve always prided myself in owning one small car that we use largely to get around town. I’m frugal and not a big consumer. We make small amounts of trash compared to our neighbors. I’ve wintered in Spain for 17 years, but never rented a car. I walk most of the time and take a bus occasionally. I didn’t own a car for almost three years when I lived abroad. Yet, despite all of that and now COVID, I’ve truly come to see how on the grand scale, I’m very privileged. It’s humbling. I’m being forced to make choices that feel like sacrifices when there’s many who’ve never had these choices in the first place.
Those of us with privilege will talk ourselves into doing whatever we please just because we can.
We’re the lucky ones. As we criss cross the skies in airplanes we’ll be hoping to dodge COVID and climate change. We’ll expect to be able to do whatever we want, because that’s the way it’s always been. We can’t even imagine coming from one of those countries where the masses struggle for food and will never set foot in an airplane. If we’re one of the super rich, our footprint is even bigger. During COVID lockdowns, the super rich continued to travel. We were told not to, but they never stopped.
There’s something about a private jet and multiple houses all over the world that exempts a person from restrictions.
But hey, who can refuse privilege of any kind. Not many. It seems to be part of human nature to feel entitled rather than grateful. We’ve come to expect a certain lifestyle.
Traveling is just a tiny piece of entitlement.
So travel is here to stay for a while longer at any rate. We shall see what the future holds. Scientific predictions aren’t terribly promising. I can’t help but feel sorry for modern humans, however. The amazing number of inventions that have made life easier for us are quite recent overall. Add the unprecedented number of medical breakthroughs, and we’re living in the most advanced era of human history. Our ancestors would think they’d landed on another planet if they returned. Who wouldn’t want to keep our current way of life? Contrary to romantic notions, the past was really hard and average lifespans were a lot shorter.
And yet, our very success may also bring us down unless we apply our creative powers to solve looming problems.
Innovation may save the day, ushering in a new reality, but not without a fight from the status quo. Our privilege doesn’t guarantee insight or a proactive mindset.
The next chapter is being written as we board a plane to Italy. We have a few spoiler alerts to contend with but we’re pretty good at not paying attention to them. We’re keeping our fingers crossed in the meantime.
Bon voyage.
Teresa is a retired educator, author, world traveler, and professional myth buster. You can find her books on Amazon.
