After having managed to avoid Rona for a year and a half, she had finally managed to claim me as her next victim.
A year and a half that saw me embark on several trips to London, a two week holiday to Magaluf and a return trip to Scotland for a few days which coincided with their lifting of all Covid restrictions. Yet, it was while I was in Dubai, where the cases were supposedly ‘decreasing,’ that I finally tested positive. And to that, I shall simply repeat the famous words of Chewin’ the Fat – I smell shite.
Anyway, with the positive test result finally landing at my doorstep, I suddenly found myself confined to my apartment. Ten days isolation.
However, while the thought of having to isolate for ten days had previously sent me into a cold sweat, I was in fact very much looking forward to being confined to my apartment. The reason for my changed outlook? Well, because it meant ten days of us. Ten days of me and Mr. Buff.
While things had been less than great recently with a vodka coke and a splash of tears being my usual poison on most of our recent nights out together, I was optimistic that this could be what saves us…or breaks us.
As we had both tested positive for Covid, it only made sense that we should isolate together. I mean, first of all, he shared with others, I lived alone…I had a balcony we could sunbathe on, he didn’t…and there was definitely more ways to pass the time together as opposed to by ourselves…I’ll let your imaginations figure that one out (and if it went straight to meaning we could play boardgames, then you would be 100 percent absolutely correct!).
It was an opportunity for us to reconnect through turning isolation into isolafun – see what I did there? Yes, I know I’m a loser…
But isolafun was the best way to describe it and, like all of our fellow isolatee predecessors, we solidly made our way through the isolation activity checklist.
Isolation checklist activity number one: Start a new series. Or in our case, re-watch the entire series of Game of Thrones for the fifteenth time to still be traumatised and require therapy from the Red Wedding.
Isolation checklist activity number two: Order random home gym equipment such as skipping ropes and dumbbells; all of which you will never use again once you get back to the real world.
Isolation checklist activity number three: Bake! Or attempt to bake something that on the surface appears to be a pancake but when you delve a little deeper you realise it would probably make a much better door stop….
Isolation checklist activity number four: Purchase a variety of mix matched activities such as badminton, Battleships, table tennis and playing cards to play once and then never use again.
Isolation checklist activity number five: Drink, drink and, oh yeah, drink!
Isolation checklist activity number six: Descend into madness as you discuss questions such as: If you had to kill one of your best friends, who would it be? Or if we had never met, where would you be right now? Probably not isolating and Covid free was my answer to that one in case anyone was interested…
Isolation checklist activity number seven: Have a spa day. Complete with facemasks, cucumber and Asian inspired music to have the full girls day in experience.
Yip, we solidly made our way through the checklist of pointless activities to do to pass the time and pass the time we did, with the ten days seeming to fly by in the blink of an eye.
And, while the ten days had genuinely seen us both do nothing but laugh, smile and connect in each other’s company, I knew it still wasn’t enough. Like a fortune teller reading their own future, I knew that our isolafun wouldn’t save us. It had acted as a painkiller, numbing us from the real world, from our problems that existed beyond the walls of my apartment and sooner or later the drugs had to wear off. The pain, the problem, would have to be dealt with so we decided that going on a break after isolation was the best solution – Rachel and Ross from Friend’s realness.
Was this the outcome I had wanted? No.
However, something was no longer right between us in the real world and as much as I wanted it to work, and as much as I wanted Mr. Buff to be in my life, something had to change. I mean, how many more nights out could I go on, which ended up with me in tears?
A break was therefore definitely needed. A chance for both of us to reflect and figure out what we wanted. But as we embraced each other to say goodbye, I clutched onto him harder than I had ever done before with my inner fortune teller looking at the cards dealt with trepidation…