ELENA: Now that Boadicea is on the hard in a boatyard and you and I are living on land, how did your vision of your future change?
MEG: My vision of the future hasn’t actually changed. Certainly, being on land confirms the incredible difference between being on land and being not on land. Being on land is certainly easier, for the most part, however it is insanely expensive and exposes us to unfathomable risk because we’re simply at the mercy of others.
My vision for the future hasn’t changed. Without money there will be no future. Therefore, my only concern is finding a way to bring in some money so that we may have a future. To that end, all I can think of and concentrate on because it’s the only shot we’ve got, is to sell the story.
ELENA: What does Saint Martin provide for us?
MEG: A parking spot in exchange for vast sums of money. Which means it’s kind of a trade off, we trade off some safety and future and we have a place to park the boat and work on fixing whatever we can afford.
ELENA: Did being around people ease your isolation? The feeling that you two are totally on your own?
MEG: No. In fact, it actually made it worse. The black people look at us and treat us with contempt and outright hatred, the white people are slob tourists off cruise ships who see nothing but what they want to and most of it from the bottom of a bottle. So for me, I think the loneliness is worse here than it is on the high seas.
ELENA: Any changes with your health? What are you doing about it? What is there to do about it on Saint Martin if anything?
MEG: My health seems to be deteriorating. Although, I’m just guessing. The increasing levels of stress (going into astronomical levels of credit card debt) may in fact have something to do with making chronic symptoms feel worse. I’m still stone cold deaf on one side, still dizzy as a drunk, and hearing tinnitus that rivals a jet engine strapped to the side of my head.
Although, I have started hearing voices. I can tell that they’re not real because I can hear them from both ears. And I seem to be developing some kind of a freaking digestive blockage, incredibly painful, which has me thinking no solid food for a while because I think I’m gonna tear myself a new asshole.
What am I doing about it? Went to see a doctor at a walk-in clinic, he has referred me to ear nose and throat at the hospital, which resembles a stockade assembled from shipping containers and barn-like structures full of coughing, snotting wailing, people and babies in air filled with flies and walls crawling with lizards. I had to go to that lovely place simply to make an appointment to go back to that lovely place on Tuesday. The GP thinks I need a hearing test! How stupid… I am stone cold deaf on that side I already know the results of a freaking hearing test. Asked if I could pay out of pocket for an MRI scan, I was told that the healthcare system here is proudly socialised medicine and that would not happen or be allowed. Yay! And socialised or not, I still get to pay for it and take hundred dollar taxi rides to shit hole Livestock handling facilities they call hospitals or clinics.
So the plan is to try for this appointment at the stockade/hospital and then book and pay for an MRI scan at a private facility on the French side of the island.
ELENA: Any ideas where we might come in from the sea? And is it even doable for us in the near future?
MEG: No, I have absolutely no idea where that might be.
As for doable, that’s gonna come down to money. And money is going to come down to selling the story.
ELENA: So, is all lost for us then? What is it you need to happen for your situation to improve? And is this in your power? Is there something others can do for you?
MEG: There’s no way I can tell you one way or another whether all is lost or not. I simply don’t know. I do know how I feel though and I feel that not all is lost or I wouldn’t be here still. I guess, that as long as I’m alive, there is hope. Hope dies last.
What we need to happen for the situation to improve is to make some money! Is making money in my power? Yes! I think so. I have to, otherwise there’ll be no point going on.
As for something others can do for us? Yeah, they can publicise the story, raise its value by getting it in front of more eyeballs.