I have to wait for the vaccine.
When my turn comes, I go back to Kenya.
I have been repeating this mantra in my head for days, weeks.
I have reassured relatives, I have reopened the shop that costs me more than anything else.
Luckily I own it, but I still wouldn't find a dog who would rent it and buy me all the goods inside.
Last year I did well with my granddaughter back from the States.
We did November and December together, Christmas shopping and then I left for Watamu.
She stayed there and many were more pleased to find a leggy 25 year old than the usual 50 year old struggling with lateral overhangs and vertical drops.
This year in August a window of hope had opened up for me.
The second wave, and then everything will be fine, so I can make it by the beginning of January.
Instead... I have to wait for the vaccine.
I mean, it's not that I HAVE to. I'd say I'd like to wait for the vaccine, but I don't even know why.
In reality, it seems to me that I have understood that the vaccine is much more necessary here in Italy, in Europe, and I don't have to go to the Canary Islands like my friend Cinzia, or do the detox week in Fiuggi.
I have Africa waiting for me!
I have my small flat in front of the Fortamu beach, my friends and the wonderful family of Johnatan, the gardener of the residence.
Johnatan is a candid soul, I'll tell you right now that he is not my "toy-boy" so you can avoid criticism like when I put the photo of us in his village on Facebook.
He has a wife, four children, the youngest of whom bears my name, and has grown up healthy, I say this without false modesty, thanks to my help. Not only financially, but logistically: if I hadn't taken her to a specialist, she would probably never have walked. The local doctor kept telling her to wait until she was on her feet.
But back to me and these desperate times in Italy.
I know very well what I should do: molecular swab 96 hours before arriving, QR code, a self-certification that I am moving to Kenya because I have rented a house in my name and there I indicate my temporary domicile for 3 months.
All very easy.
So why don't I leave?
I don't leave because basically I can't be reckless.
In the past I have had the cheerful superficiality of trusting local people who have made me do bad business, even if the worst I have done was to enter into a partnership with an Italian woman I met in Watamu whom I thought was a friend.
But those are naivety, which makes experience and in the end only your wallet pays and which, for better or worse, you take like a bet at the roulette wheel.
But you don't gamble with your health.
I can't trust Johnatan who tells me on whatsapp "hakuna corona", I can't believe those who say that everyone goes around without a mask and nobody dies.
Someone died, I know, someone was sick because there was no oxygen in the hospital.
Someone, and I am talking about Italians, spent much more than the journey and the stay for a week of treatment in a private hospital.
Africa is my lightness, but in this heavy period it would alleviate very little.
That is why I have decided that I will return, after having had the vaccine.