"Do you want to spend your life looking backwards?"

I looked at her as if the question had come from her lips, but she hadn't spoken. She was just sitting there next to me in the front seat, in the parking lot of the place where she worked. I told her I would drop by later, and she seemed happy enough about that. After I left I turned off my phone and my GPS, and made the first wrong turn I could find. It wasn't the first time. I must have driven for the better part of an hour by the time I stopped. I looked around, and was pleased to see not one familiar landmark. There were cattle grazing in the field to my left, and a fairly steep drop to the right. I sat on the guard rail, and just took it all in. There was something therapeutic about it, sounds and smells and sights all mingling together to form the prescription that I had so desperately needed. I didn't go see her that night. I didn't go see anyone. I would have slept on that guard rail if I wouldn't have frozen. She never called to ask where I was, and I never told her. Somewhere in the back of her mind, I think she knew, and I hoped she was proud of me. I was finally looking up, and what lay ahead seemed marvelous.