No, not a double shot of whiskey, cappuccino, an amusement park ride in NJ, or even “of my baby’s love”. How about the Covid-19 vaccine, or at least part one. People especially prone to disease or otherwise fragile were the first to be inoculated and now it’s being rolled out to the rest of us as fast as it becomes available. Dentists, medical students, lab technicians and even veterinarians have been recruited to use their skills in getting everyone covered. Our booster shot is scheduled for a month from now and then what? Given that we have a year’s worth of travel to catch up on, that’s pretty simple to answer; except, as we hear so often from our French friends, it’s complicated.

It was a little over a year ago when we returned from a great trip to a city that we had long wanted to visit, Florence, Italy. Within hours of crossing back into France, the border was closed and remained that way for months. Although it is now possible to travel to some of the other countries within the European Union you can’t easily go further. Complication? No problem, we’ll just stay within this country and travel by train. They are still accepting reservations on their full schedule but it’s best to confirm 24 hours in advance that your train is going to run the next day. Complication? Perhaps, but what about those hotel reservations we had already paid for a year ago to visit the Atlantic coast near Bordeaux? Our credit is valid for at least 18 months to be used on a future stay, as long as the hotel is open. Bars, restaurants, museums, monuments? Yes, it’s complicated but luckily the situation will be improving over the next four weeks.

Looks like we might be staying home for a while longer but it’s not just travel that we’ve missed out on. We live in a city but our neighborhood feels like a village in that we have lots of shops within walking distance and our neighbors are our friends. In the “old days” hardly a weekend went by when we weren’t enjoying drinks and/or dinner with someone from the homes surrounding ours. I look forward to renewing all of those friendships.