I have three existential fears: snakes, premature burial and standing in lines. For anything, for any reason. When I saw those lines in front of stores that had nothing to sell in the days of the old Soviet Union, my stomach would be in knots just from watching the footage. Closer to home, I don’t stand in front of the deli counter at supermarkets that have more than one person ahead of me, no take-a-number machine and only one counter person, who seems obsessively preoccupied with slicing ham for the display case, instead of waiting on customers.

   So it was that when Carol breezily announced that she had confirmed reservations for the first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine to be administered at nearby Disneyland that I reacted as if a Burmese python was coiling itself around my torso, or a coffin lid was being lowered over my still blinking eyes.

   All I could think of was the lines we’d be facing. After all, it was Disneyland, an amusement park established for people who believe standing in lines for hours is part of the excitement. I considered the alternative of just letting the virus run its course, and to be part of the idiotic “herd immunity” solution to the pandemic. But the look I got from Carol when I voiced my objections told me there are worse things to die from than Covid-19.

   We arrived in one of the Disneyland parking lots an hour early for our appointment, another concession to Carol’s overly cautious concern of somehow missing the appointment time. This, in spite of having been informed by a friend that got the vaccine the day before that they were running an hour behind. That meant we had baked in two hours of waiting before we would even start the process, and no telling what kind of lines awaited us there. I emerged from the car with both a slithering feel and overpowering sense of confinement surrounding me.

   All I could think of was the lines we’d be facing. After all, it was Disneyland, an amusement park established for people who believe standing in lines for hours is part of the excitement.

   Once we got going though, I became increasingly relieved at the level of organization that existed for a mass vaccination rollout that had been only three days in the making. Security and staff were uniformly helpful and friendly. There were many repeated announcements of what documentation to be kept at the ready for each station in the process, as if they instinctively knew the limitations of a parking lot full of doddering 65 and ups.

   All the steps in the process made sense, which was surprising for a government supported effort, and the stations were set up to move you quickly through. From the time of our appointment to the actual injection was precisely one hour behind, just as Carol’s friend had predicted. I was heartened, as I sat in the post-shot waiting tent, to think the process will only get better organized as time goes on, and that the second dose might go even more smoothly. I sat there with a breezy sense of vacationing emanating throughout the tent, which the vaccine surely offered the potential for getting Carol and me on a plane, train and automobile again soon.

   Straight away to Inverness and one of those Outlander tours.