How I Talked My Way into My Second Vaccination When I Didn't Have an Appointment

I wish I could say I huffed, I puffed, I blew their house down and then the doctor stuck the needle in my arm--but this is only a partial truth. Germany currently offers the second dose of BioNtech/Pfizer six weeks after the first, and the evidence currently suggests that it's best to get the second shot twenty-one days after the first--or as close to that as possible.

I got the first shot on March 31 after walking into a center, waving my doctor's letter and the official form she'd filled out. This time, I thought they'd throw me out since I didn't have the document establishing that I actually had an appointment--Germany loves documents--but I did have my doctor's second letter, which insisted that I needed the dose twenty-one days after the first, and provided a link to an article offering medical proof. I also had that fancy form, the one I'd brought the first time. 

This time, they were prepared for people like me. Instead of brooking a nervous clerk at a desk who discussed me with a colleague and then filled out another form, I was facing uniformed guards in highly polished shoes, bright yellow vests worn over their blue serge outfits. The message was clear: they were traffic cops and I was a runaway van.

I said I had a bad diagnosis. I said I had three kids, wanted to be around for them, was widowed, and here are my papers. "Auf die Seite!" they said--"Stand to the side," so I did, and finally another guard in a different vest appeared. They had a range of snazzy uniforms. I offered my tale, again, and the man rolled his eyes at the letter and at my complaints of "Querdenkers" (anti-maskers) at my kid's school. He didn't want to hear about that. A true German, he wanted a definite, particular, singular reason. He told me I would get the shot "auf Medicinischen Gründen"--that was respectable, my other reasons not, and I shut up. Was I getting regular chemo? Yes indeedy. That's sort of true. Let him picture substances related to biowarfare dripping into my veins and making me bald. He did not need to know that my current chemo is a gentle little violet pill. There are the unpleasant injections, but only once a month.

I didn't believe I was actually going to get the shot until I was in the little booth:

Sitting in front of the plastic barrier I allowed myself to relax. But time went by. Where was everybody? A nurse popped her head into the cabin and said they were waiting for the vaccine. Immediately I wondered if they'd run out, but they did come through and my arm is now, after my second dose, sincerely sore, as if it had been clonked with a baseball bat. I have no fever but feel tired and slightly achey. No cross trainer for me today! But folks, here's the vaccination hall:

See all the people?

More people! So crowded!

I arrived around 10:15 in the morning, and after my grueling begging and document-waving session with the guard was admitted and done by 11:01--I stuck around for half an hour just in case, as the doctor recommended. Above, you see the folks leaving with me. When I entered the gigantic hall, I counted around thirteen people waiting, some at desks filling out forms and some patiently waiting in chairs. Everybody in my town wants their vaccinations, and few have gotten them. 

Yesterday, I finally got an email response to my emails of March 3, including the forms I was waving around, and not counting the two phone calls I made between March 3 and the day I gave up on actually getting an appointment for my first shot and just walked in. The email said they could now offer me my first shot on April 24, and my second six weeks after!

I did write them back today and urge them to give the appointment to someone else. But if you really want your vaccinations, behave badly--as I did. The clerks are too busy filling out paperwork to arrange for vaccinations.