The wall leaned over me this morning. I thought being at home would offer me peace.

It offered me hours of stupid phone games while I ignored The Office. I tried to push forward. I tried to settle into a normalcy that felt frantic and frenetic. I scrolled through games. Defeated massive cookies and challenges. And just felt nervous.

I settled into a vague nerve meditation. That eased me the need to move. The need to shift and settle and resettle and reshift.

I leaned on my games. I leaned on my prayers and meditations and a facade of peace.

I leaned on my dogs and my couch and found that my chest tightened and my anxiety shifted through my shoulders and along my spine.

I tried to talk myself into staying home.

But I could feel it. The need to run away. To escape from the television and the phone and the sofas and the 35 ounce bottle of water that I keep emptying and refilling because maybe I’m just dehydrated.

Sure. That’s it.

But I wasn’t fine in my house and ignoring one screen while being miserable with my engagement with another and everything else felt exhausting and overwhelming.

I wasn’t going to go to the mountains. I was going to go to the highway that bisects the mountains.

But I followed the road as the anxiety bled through me. And I wept. I wept for my brother. I wept for the quietness that inhabits my life. I wept for the empty space within me and waiting for me at the creek.

And so I followed the road as it swung up the mountain and waited in traffic until the road opened up. And then I crested the mountain ridge where the opening to Shenandoah National Park awaited me

And I tuned south and followed the road down the ridges backs of the hibernating mountains.

Almost a month ago, I had done this pilgrimage, only driving north. Today, the dogs and I went the opposite way and stared down into valleys swathed in ceruleans, crimsons, and embered oranges.

The dogs snored. Deer stood along the road’s edge, feasting on autumnal grasses. And I coasted through the tight turns and breathed in quiet awe at the tawny red tree branches spanning the road.

I breathed. I leaned into the road. I leaned into the road’s tight curves. And I leaned against the wall that I would have sprinted into if I had not taken the day from work.

If I had not fled from my house and escaped to the mountains.

I could not think today. I could not focus or really feel. I just existed and tried to find the end of the day but the day kept expanding and I had to leave.

I had to run without sprinting or dashing or tearing away. I had to breathe and exist and lean against the wall that was not a threat or a punishment.

Rather. It was my sanctuary. A low slung rock wall that I could lean against or climb over so my dogs could sniff and pee on the grass or I could sit on and feel the chill wind breathe through my husband’s shirt that I stole because I am desperate for comfort.

The wall separated me from nothing and everything. It kept me from slipping over a rocky, tree meshed edge. It kept me from staring vacant eyes at my students.

It supported me while I watched sunlight spill over the mountains. And the leaf that clung to my rear windshield for half a mile rested against the wall when I pulled over to retrieve a leaf that helped me see more than emptiness.