Waiting, Time and Visas

There is an old saying that goes "Time and tide wait for no man," which basically means that no person is powerful enough to stop the march of time. Which brings me to my pet hate, waiting. I hate waiting with such a passion it is unbelievable and that is a case where time drags its feet. Seriously. Don't you just hate waiting?  Don't you hate not having any control?  Another thing I have come to realise is that everybody has their own agenda and it doesn't always coincide or fit well with yours.  This of course can make life quite interesting while we all try to juggle our time.  It's difficult to plan ahead when you don't know exactly what someone you are relying on has planned.  What is a priority for you might not be a priority for them and therein lies many frustrations.

Take for instance my daughter's student visa application for Canada.  You already have to wait weeks for a reply then they go and have a strike so that visa processing slows down to a virtual halt.  They didn't care about the many futures that were being put on hold for international students from all over the world.  Then you get a letter declining the visa because her home ties were not strong enough.  So now it's a hindrance if you work at international schools and give your child an international education if they are wanting to study in Canada.  That doesn't sound very logical to me.  Many people choose to work abroad for whatever reason.  Their children should not be punished for it.
I'm still waiting for my visa so I can start my new job.  First they need a certain document that takes 8 weeks to get, then you have to wait for the couriered document to reach its destination, then wait for it to be processed, then wait for it to be couriered back to you.  An enormous amount of waiting that is beyond your control.  You can't move forward until you have it and there is nothing you can do to expedite it.  Totally out of your control.  My flight is booked for next week.  At this stage it is highly unlikely I'll be on it.  Frustration rules.
As I'm having a bit of a rant I may as well add in medical insurance.  Of course after you submit a claim you have to wait around 3 weeks to get your money back.  What makes me see red, is when you wait three weeks and then only get a fraction of what they owe you.  The reason given is insufficient documentation.  So you resend exactly the same documentation you did before.  There's nothing else extra you can really send and wait another three weeks and then they pay you.  Why could they not have just paid it the first time around?  Do they think I like to wait 6 weeks for money I've already paid out to be refunded?  More waiting.  I hate it.
One would think with all this waiting around I would have had a lot of time to write.  But here's the thing.  Although waiting has made time drag, time has also sped by so quickly that my two months holiday is nearly over.  How can that be possible?  I'd wanted to finish Hush Baby.  I had two months to do it.  Where has time gone?  Why have I wasted so much time and on what?  I can't even remember.  My goals for this holiday were:  finish the first draft of Hush Baby, work on Diary of a Dancer, take the ferry to Robben Island and visit Nelson Mandela's prison cell, go up in the cable car to the top of Table Mountain and do a Cape Malay Cooking Course.  While I have done some work on Hush Baby, I have not accomplished any of my holiday goals.  Were they unrealistic and inaccessible?  Not at all.  The fact is I thought I had two months to do them in and by my book two months is a lot of time.  Unfortunately time is running out and I have left everything until the last minute.  More frustration.
I did manage to make the time to have my health checks, do a spot of cooking, see some movies and read quite a few books so I guess it's not all bad.  But the things I haven't done are the things I really wanted to do.  I've just run out of time.
Cindy Vine is the author of Not Telling, Defective and CU@8.  All books are available on kindle and paperback at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords and the Apple iStore.