As I made my way from my house to my mom’s on early November mornings to relieve the Hospice nurse, headed into the sunrise, not sure what the sunset would bring, I would play this one over and over and almost over again.

It played two and a half times between the two points, the final half listened to in the parking lot as I dried my tears, steadied my nerves and summoned the courage to leave my car and walk inside.

Because, and it shames me to admit this, the only thing I wanted to do was run.

To fill the gas tank, change my name, turn up the volume and flee.

Leave the mother I had trouble recognizing, and the relatives I saw so clearly, putting dibs in on every, single material possession, behind, chew off the appendage of that trap jaw life and run/hobble away as fast and as far as I could.

Drive until the sun rose in full, until Arizona was a speck in the rear view, until the car gave up the ghost; shed my identity and responsibility, put as many miles as I could between where I was and any place else.

That “any place else else” in my quickly fragmenting mind, was Alaska.

I had never been and knew absolutely nothing about it, except that it called to the broken and lost and promised to mend and direct.

Or chew you up and spit you out.

Either way, you would know, in no uncertain, sentimental terms, where you stood.

Alaska, was the place you went to get lost and to find yourself.

Alaska, from the little I garnered, was vast and barren.

Simple and uncomplicated.

Bleak and unyielding.

Harsh yet steady.

A compass leading to true North.

Alaska was the place you went to find silence.

To quiet the machines and the wails and the moans and the sobs.

To quiet the voices in your head and quell the night terrors.

The place where you could scream into the wind and hear it echoed back. Feel compassion for that haunted reverberation.

Withhold judgement.

Find forgiveness for shortcomings.

Alaska was a place of absolution.

A proving ground for those seeking redemption.

Alaska.

Alaska.

Alaska.

The mantra and the challenge repeated in my mind as Eddie sang about needing more space for your stuff.

I thought about those relatives foaming at the mouth, ready to snatch and grab all they could, while I needed an entire state worth of space to dissipate and house my rage and grief.

With a foot poised over the gas, and Eddie fading into the sunrise, I turned off the engine.

My father (although he left when things became too complicated) didn’t raise a crier or a quitter.

So I put Alaska on hold.

Surpassed the father to care for the mother.

To be what he instilled in me but could never be himself.

Screamed only in my head, heard only my own voice echoed back.

Locked the doors, steadied my heart and headed inside.