Sense of Space

                The thermostat in my room read 64.5 degrees at six this morning. I wanted to crawl back under my flannel sheets as soon as my feet touched the carpet. I dressed in a long sleeved shirt, a sweatshirt, and jeans before putting on my parka, jacket, gloves, and hat before taking Grace out. Despite all those layers, the cold permeated my jeans and clung to the fabric against my skin.

                That cold got me thinking while I drove home after dropping Grace off at doggy day care. My mind returned to the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia and their constant presence at the edge of the Hollins University campus. It journeyed back over a year to the expanse of road and land around me as I drove away from Charlotte, North Carolina. All the while in the present, I drove down a two-lane road with frost-covered houses and trees crowding the gutter on either side of me.

                I’ve always been a touch claustrophobic while in crowds. But I didn’t realize the nervousness and tension applied to the physical world around me until I stood at the top of a hill on campus and looked at the buildings below, the mountains encircling me, and the wide open sky above.

I miss that sense of space.

                Even now as I type this entry and look out my window my view is crowded by the leafless trees in the swamp across the street. And the trees’ sharp branches scratch the sky, blocking any hope of seeing the openness I came to love in Virginia.

                I admire the charm of New England’s old homes and the diversity in their architecture, but the houses sit close together on small plots of land. A few sit back away from the road, at the end of long, winding driveways which lead into the woods. But the streets I drive through my hometown and the surrounding ones still feel small.

                At least once a week, I think about packing up the car and the dog. I’d drive west along I-84 until I hit Scranton, Pennsylvania and then pick up I-81 for a ride all the way down through southwest Virginia. Then branch off that south of Blacksburg, near Wytheville, onto I-77 and head straight for Charlotte.

                It wouldn’t take the whole drive south to ease the tension hovering in my muscles and bones. There’s a section of 81 in Pennsylvania where the mountains on one side of the highway give way and reveal the valley below. The mountains surround the town in the valley much like the sides of a bowl around the base. And the blue sky seems to stretch above and around the valley for miles.

                Whenever I drove this stretch of highway on my way to or from school, calm resonated outward from the deepest part of my chest. I would feel at peace.

                But the promise of the south and its expanse of space aren’t enough to uproot me right now. Responsibility always breaks that daydream. My savings account isn’t exactly full right now and what about a job to bring money in? I’ve had a hard enough time finding part time work here in Massachusetts, and even that isn’t coming close to paying my loan payments and for Grace.

                Responsibility also reminds me about my plan to attend dog trainer school at National K-9 in Ohio. I know that I’ll love being a dog trainer and that it’s a career I can take wherever I want to live. I’m budgeting just over $10,000 for tuition, housing, and expenses. I already have a quarter of the money, but saving is slow going. I can only afford to put a few hundred away toward it a month. Being me, I did the math and figured out that it’ll take me a couple years to get there. I also have to save for a German Shepherd Dog to take with me and train while there; well-bred shepherds aren’t cheap.

                I’m impatient. I also feel guilty about admitting to being impatient. I hear news stories every day about the unemployment rate in the country, and I think that I should be grateful to have two part time jobs. I should be thankful that I’m getting around thirty hours a week between the two jobs. Heck, I’ve even heard that I shouldn’t get on my employers’ bad sides by cutting hours one place to work at the other because of the flailing job market.

                I’m done feeling guilty. I shouldn’t have to feel bad for being dissatisfied with my jobs because I’m not making enough money to support myself. I shouldn’t have to put a smile on my face when I’m told for the twentieth time that I’m way overqualified for the position I applied for or the job I have.

                I’m tired of waiting in cold, claustrophobic Massachusetts. I want warm weather, my own apartment with Grace, and a job that’ll actually pay my bills. But what I want most of all, with every fiber inside of me, is the calmness I felt when I stood at the top of the Hollins campus and looked out at the mountains and the open sky.  I want to feel free.