2,460.34 miles from Santa Monica, California, to Jacksonville, Florida

Sometimes, when I am tired and stressed, I want to just get in my car and drive. No notice, no map, no worries—classic escape fantasy. West on I-10, out of Houston, on and on until the interstate ends in Santa Monica. Maybe something better will catch my eye at 3 a.m. a few miles out of Las Cruces, and I will drive north for a few hours, my head resting against the seat, three fingers on the wheel, listening to "El Condor Pasa" on repeat. Watching the scenery vaguely—sagebrush and scrub pine, the occasional deer in the few minutes before the sun blasts over the desert—but mostly focused on grey pavement and the grey bubble of Tracker interior.

I would sleep curled the back of the Tracker when I get tired, then wake up and eat Tiger Tails and black licorice Nibs from gas stations as I choose a new direction. Not a new destination, just a new direction. I will not take anything but my copy of William Matthews's selected works and a credit card. Money will work itself out somehow, and if I have to wash dishes for an hour or two, so be it. My hands aren't made of sugar.

I vacillate between going by myself, singing loudly to the bad music I love and answering all the rhetorical questions on radio shows, and taking a boy—the boy—with me to let me delve through his mind to the sultry groan of tires on asphalt. Feeling strong versus feeling safe. Regardless, I will be doing the driving. I won't stop until I hit ocean, and even then I'll drive along the coast as far as I can, with the windows down even when it rains in Oregon. I will buy ridiculous souvenirs instead of dinner: garishly colored T-shirts that I will wear until I am old and they are translucent and illegible. I will not phone home, but I will send unsigned postcards that say, "Everything's fine; the stars were especially intense last night." I will not think deep thoughts.

At last, when I am exhausted and ready to sleep in my own bed, I will come back and slide seamlessly into my life again. Nobody will mention my disappearance, but I will know that I was missed.

It'll probably never happen. But some days, the hope that it could is the only thing that keeps me hanging on.