Rumsfeld Was Right

No, I’m not re-evaluating my objections to the U.S. military adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan. Rather, I’m acknowledging and affirming one of the lessons from this summer’s emigration process. We received the contract in July and began working on a carefully articulated plan, but unknown unknowns intervened, and we’ve had to rework almost everything to do with our family life. On the other side of my first visa rejection, it’s tempting to think that I learned what was wrong with the first application and remedied it — but I’m more inclined to take it that the first rejection should function as a reminder that at any given time, we understand less about our circumstances nd the contingencies that affect us than we can know. Hence, when today comes and we don’t hear that the Embassy is processing my (second) application even though I heard that my first application was being processed after the same interval since sending it, I’m not surprised. I’m not in a position to out-think a system that I’m generally unfamiliar with; I can’t make plans as though possibilities or even likelihoods were givens. I corrected the defects that the Embassy identified in my first application, but I don’t know what other defects may persist in the second recension.
 
Which is a roundabout way of saying that we”re still waiting to hear more about my reapplication, and it would be nice if the British Ambassador would call me up and say, “Pip-pip, AKMA, old sock; come over, your visa has been approved.” But the fate of my application remains an unknown unknown.