Everyone’s Covid story is different. Mine begins back in September of 2018 when I was first introduced by Sandro Monetti to my now wife, Holly Payne at the ever-amazing Brits in L.A. pub quiz at the Cat and Fiddle. We instantly had a connection, like something beyond our control had drawn us together that fateful night. We had only just met, but I knew instantly that I was falling for Holly.
Over the next few months we spent nearly every day together while I was in L.A., until it finally came time for me to fly home to England. Over the course of the next year and a half, despite many months and many miles apart, our love grew. Holly came to visit me in the UK several times, and we had finally started to make a plan for me to visit her in Los Angeles in February 2019. But just as we were sorting out the itinerary for our L.A. reunion, Covid struck the world. Travel bans were put in place, and we were now stuck indefinitely on opposite sides of the Atlantic Ocean. Travelling to L.A. should have been easy; at any other time, I’d simply hop on a plane to be with her, but Covid had other plans for us. Holly and I were devastated. Like everyone else, we hunkered down in the hopes that we would see only a short break from society norms for a few months, but as we now know, that break would never come. Throughout those early Covid months, we continued to imagine ways we could safely find a way to be together. We spent many a sleepless night talking on Skype and Zoom, willfully rebelling against our eight hour time delay, playing countless games of Words With Friends, watching movies, making meals together via our computer screens, all the while not knowing when we would be able to hold each other again. But after months of research and planning, we managed to work out a safe way for me to travel without risk to my own health or the health of others. Our plan however would involve me travelling for a total of eighteen days to three separate countries, and five international cities. I’d need to pack enough luggage to last me three months in L.A., while simultaneously securing my gear enough to minimize contamination. Determined, I loaded myself up with surgical gloves, double filtered government-issue masks, face shields and hand sanitizer to last my entire trip.
My journey began in my hometown of Deal, Kent, then a stop in Folkestone, and then to London where I would stay the night before heading off from Heathrow to Amsterdam the following day. From Amsterdam, I’d fly to Mexico City where I would quarantine for fifteen nights. I was hell bent on reuniting with Holly and driven by my determination to make it to L.A. safely and to not contract this deadly disease. Still, after taking every possible precaution, I was terrified that I would be turned away once I got to LAX, and be forced to return to the UK before I’d even made it out of my gate. Could this really work? Well, I’d have plenty of time to dwell on it while quarantining in Mexico. And thanks to Covid, I was the only guest at my hotel for thirteen of the fifteen days I was there. This meant staying there felt like being holed up in some kind of weird tropical paradise bunker. For thirteen days it was just me and my lovely hosts, the owners of Casa Emilia Hotel. It felt like we were survivors of a zombie apocalypse that we knew was raging outside, but inside, we were safe and secure within our little paradise complex.
For those fifteen days in Mexico, I killed time watching Mexican TV and movies, eating way too many quesadillas, making short films, and battling cabin fever in anxious anticipation of my pending arrival at LAX. What lifted my spirits was the bliss of knowing that the time difference between me and Holly now was only two hours! Finally we could spend most of our days talking on Zoom without having to stay up till the wee hours just to catch a glimpse of each other. Every morning of my Mexican quarantine I was running system checks on my body, inspecting it and taking note of even the slightest change to make sure I didn’t have the virus.
Finally, after fifteen strange and memorable days, my departure date had arrived! So far so good! No fever, and no symptoms to speak of! I bid farewell to my amazing hosts and was finally on my way in a private taxi to board my flight to reunite with Holly in Los Angeles! Well… not yet… alas, I was thwarted yet again and rerouted for a stopover in Salt Lake City. Great. Just what I needed. Yet another panic inducing delay! But never mind. I remained calm and boarded my flight to SLC. Upon my arrival at Salt Lake City Customs, I was surprised to find that it was like having a chat to an old friend. All of my paranoia started to melt away. My customs officer even seemed surprised that I was wearing a mask, as in his words, “I was too young to worry about getting Covid and therefore had nothing to fear”.
I called Holly from the SLC airport, and she asked me urgently, “Did they stamp your passport? Because if they did, YOU’RE IN! You’ve made it through!!! You’re safe!”. They had, and I was. We both breathed a huge sigh of relief. Now it was only a matter of hours until I’d be with her in L.A. The giddy excitement was really setting in now. I landed in L.A., and it was magically effortless. I had made it! After eighteen days of travel, anticipation, paranoia, and excitement, there she was, standing right there in front of me! We could barely speak, we were so overcome with emotion, and yet we still had to keep our distance. Damn Covid!
The irony was that I had I travelled the whole breadth of the planet, through multiple cities, overcome endless barriers and yet we still had an invisible six foot wall between us, but this time, at long last, distance wouldn’t be an issue. We felt like we had done the impossible, like we had pulled off a bank heist! Love had won! On our drive home we blasted the Star Wars theme, me sat in the backseat, and we felt like we had our life back. The physical separation was torture during my days in isolation after I’d arrived, but then… the Big Day. My Covid test! Did we do it? Had I managed to travel this far, past thousands of people, transported by Planes, Trains and Automobiles? Did I or did I not have Covid??? I’ll let you guess the end…
I’ll tell ya though, you have never had a better kiss than one that you have waited for, for nearly eight months when you have been separated from the love of your life. After being together in L.A. for three months, we decided that we would never be forced apart again and promptly got married in Vegas with our good friend and fellow Brits in L.A. member Blaise Serra as our witness and Elvis as our officiant! We’ve been a husband and wife in lockdown for five months now, and even with all its struggles, life is absolute bliss. Love always finds a way!
