Of the plans and the times

Signposts of the Passion

Two Easter weekends ago, I had arrived in South Africa, met up with Brian in Johannesburg, and we both travelled to Cape Town where we spent 12 days, the blossoming of a new relationship and probably one of the most exciting times in my life. It was an opportunity to get to know each other better, after the sudden opportunity to meet in Johannesburg in late February 2019.

The Easter meeting had been planned from mid-January, I just knew I wanted to see him again and find out if there was a prospect of something between us. After that April meeting, the plans to meet over the summer were thwarted that it was not until September and then December that we met again.

By then, I was sure I was ready for a lifelong relationship with all the formalities that would establish us as a couple and married. My projection was for last year’s Easter, but the pandemic had taken hold, I was out of work and we were in lockdown. Every prospect of meeting up just looked ever so distant, opportunities quickly fizzling out as our host country was not accepting guests and England ended up in a second lockdown.

The plan waits for its time

Surely, when we next meet, I thought again, we could get it done, tie the knot and finalise the formalities. That is what I thought we would do when we met up in December after 11 months apart, but things did not go our way. Bureaucracy, officialdom, and an absence of waivers even in the midst of a pandemic meant we had to schedule it for another time. However, we now knew what to do.

I cannot say we would have been able to consider it this Easter weekend, much as I would have loved to get or steal away. There is an international travel ban from England and our countries are in various forms of lockdown that militates against our plans. We are hopeful and looking forward, and even if our apparently well-laid plans have been tossed by circumstances beyond our control, I have the feeling that by the next Easter weekend, we would be telling a different and amazing story.