This Thursday Morning was the Big Day !
Your favourite local Labyrinth Maker, wore his Red Labyrinth TEE, to the Mobile Vaccination Clinic !
I signed up at 10:03 p.m. last night on a Stand By List for First Doses at MAC ICCO, Islamic Community Centre of Ontario operated by Muslim Association of Canada.
There was no guarantee of getting a first shot today, the email confirmation warned us.
We may have to wait all day from 11 a.m. until 6 p.m.
But that’s not what happened at all.
The company that was outsourced by the Region of Peel to handle the online booking system for Vaccine Doses at this location pretty much were overwhelmed, almost from the first day registration opened on April 30 2021.
Confirmation emails or phone calls were not being sent or made.
Many people had MISSED their confirmed Vaccine Appointments at this Mobile Vaccination Clinic.
MAC created an easier parallel online booking system for “Standby Appointments” to ensure all available doses were used.
Almost all the people ahead of me in line that you can see in the above photograph, were Standby.
And all of us received our first dose of Moderna before Noon !
There was a somewhat Labyrinthy Experience to everything.
Before you enter you start with Questions,
Like any worthwhile Labyrinth walk.
Having satisfied the Security Guard that we were Vaccine Dose eligible,
we enter the Vaccine Clinic Labyrinth . . .
Followed a winding path marked by duct tape on the carpet and arrows stickered on the floor 6 feet apart.
Sometimes the Centre of a Labyrinth has spaces that resemble rose petals or alcoves.
People sometimes sit down in those places inside the Centre.
Today’s Centre has Vaccine Stations.
And this where I sat down . . .
My Vaccine Dose was administered by Andrei, a registered nurse.
I asked him if there was any difference between getting jabbed in the right arm or the left arm.
It was something I had been wondering about.
Did the Heart being closer to one’s left arm have anything to do with it?
Nope.
There was no difference in efficacy, either arm can be chosen to receive the jab.
Because some people might feel a little soreness for a day or so in their arm,
People are recommended to get jabbed in their less dominant arm.
I am mostly right-handed, so I got jabbed in my left arm.
IF any soreness pops up today or tomorrow, my right-handedness won’t suffer.
Oh okay.
Minor Mystery solved.
Here we go . . .
Time of Dose : 11:37 a.m.
I know I felt something,
but I almost can’t describe what getting the needle in the arm felt like.
Painless.
Over in seconds, if that.
As almost everybody knows by now,
After getting your first dose,
You need to hang around on site for 15 minutes.
If this were a trip,
This is the part where we ask, “Are we there yet?”
Because we are stationary,
We instead ask, “Are we then yet?”
Like the Jab that was painless,
This passing of 15 minutes of time went by almost unnoticed.
Because I was a Standby Vaccine Appointment, while checking out at the exit desk, they could not confirm date and time for my second dose.
That would be in an email to be sent later.
No matter.
I was giddy and feeling euphoric while this portrait of me standing beside the retractable Vaccination banner stand while pointing to my jabbed arm was being taken by a MAC ICCO volunteer.
Many times, one needs to walk a Labyrinth more than once to get the most out of it.
I’ve gotten my first Vaccine Dose at the Mobile Vaccination Clinic today.
To ensure COVID-19 immunity, I need to repeat the steps above a second time, but that’s for another day.
