My journey was cut short by a pandemic and though I initially thought that I’d barrel through it, the slow and certain realization that this was the real deal, that this actually going to effectet my travel plans made being on the road for the first time impossible to continue. Where I had been free to traverse from state to state, only limited by the places I wanted to see and the perpetual need for diesel, now it was an 1,100 mile beeline home to PA from a Florida campground I had traveled to for a wedding that was cancelled.
I have enjoyed several months in the southwest, in the open desert of Quartzite. Here you congregate with your fellow RVer in a truly beautiful, open terrain. Even when there are thousands of RVs there for a big tent show or rallies, there is still a sense of space between you and your neighbor. Coming together for a campfire, for a hike, for a ride into town, for a hike, for a UTV (ultra terrain vehicle) ride across the desert are all things I truly enjoy doing while there. But those things are in the rear view mirror now, only pictures and memories.
Now the RV is in storage and I’m back home where my world view has been compressed by a brutally efficient and dangerous virus. Now I’m socially distant by dictate, wearing a face mask out in the empty town, carefully avoiding other human beings in the process, not even wanting to make eye contact. But mostly I am in a quarantine state. I haven’t seen my son for he too is in a quarantine state. What I do feel is keenly aware of when I cough, when I have a headache – IS THIS IT? DO I HAVE IT? thoughts all SHOUT their way into my unsure and worried mind.
By nature I’m an optimist. I feel that when the time comes to de-self-quarantine I’ll do so with reckless glee and abandon. I will return to the southwest, I will pull my chair up to a new neighbor in the campground and share the adventures of that particular day. This pandemic has made me truly appreciate the freedom I have taken for granted each day.
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