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You say there is a horse in your bathroom, and all you can do is stand there naming Beatles songs?鈥� asks my 15-year-old son, Zach.

The sun is beating down, and we鈥檙e sitting on the cement back steps of my dad鈥檚 rock house, a sprawling structure one mile off Highway 50 and 60 miles west of Austin in central Nevada. Zach reads to me from听Dirk Gently鈥檚 Holistic Detective Agency听by Douglas Adams. Adams, best known forThe听Hitchhiker鈥檚 Guide to the Galaxy,听dedicated this book to his mother who liked the science-fiction mystery for 鈥渢he bit about the horse.鈥�

A few minutes earlier when Zach held up the tattered book he found in a box of my dad鈥檚 dusty paperbacks and asked if I wanted to hear it, I didn鈥檛 hesitate. 鈥淵es, absolutely,鈥� I said, the answer I always want to give when he makes such requests, though too often it鈥檚 something I can鈥檛, or don鈥檛, pull off. Like the spring he wanted me to read the entire 118-book Japanese manga series of听One Piece听or the evening he asked me to watch vampire movies when I had a paper due the next day.

鈥淭here was something odd about the horse,鈥� Zach continues reading, 鈥渂ut he couldn鈥檛 say what. Well, there was one thing that was clearly odd about it indeed, which was that it was standing in a college bathroom.鈥�

I laugh, and not just because it鈥檚 a funny book. Dad鈥檚 house has 18-inch thick rock walls, 10-foot high ceilings and seven doors to the outside.听 Built in 1899 before indoor plumbing, two rooms originally used as bedrooms have been converted into oddly large bathrooms with doors opening to the outside. Dust and wind creep in through the doors. If ever there was a place where you might find a horse in the bathroom, it would be here.

It鈥檚 my two teenage boys鈥� first full week out of school for the summer after a busy few months. When I admit to being overcommitted recently, Zach replies, 鈥淚t鈥檚 always like this, mom.鈥�

He鈥檚 right. His dad and I both work full-time. I鈥檓 in a part-time MFA program, and his twin brother, Nate, runs track and plays the guitar. Zach is in band and theater. In the spring it seemed most of our conversations were about schedules, rides and food.

A stranger sitting on these back steps would likely see the wire clothesline sagging with clothes, the three broken-down grills and a flatbed truck that is more ornamental than functional. I see an afternoon as expansive as this valley of caramel sand and stubborn sage.

A few days ago we drove the 891 miles from Boulder along Highway 50, dubbed the 鈥淟oneliest Road in America鈥� by听Life听magazine, in weather that produced high winds, rain and a cloud-and-lights show rivaling any movie. Driving instead of flying and seeing through the eyes of a 15-year-old have cleared my head.

On our second morning of the road trip Nate drove the first 200 miles, and Zach took the wheel in Ely, Nev., where my family lived until I was six. Zach has had his learner鈥檚 permit for several months, but it was his first time driving above 55 mph and in temperamental weather.

鈥淲hat鈥檚 the longest you鈥檝e driven before today?,鈥� I asked a few hours into his leg of the drive.

鈥淚鈥檝e mainly driven up and down Lowell Boulevard near our house [in a Denver suburb],鈥� he says. Then he smiled, 鈥淭oday I鈥檝e driven through hail and wind and rain.鈥�

The rain was clearing, and I had been staring out the side window.

鈥淭ake a picture, mom,鈥� Zach said.

I started to take a picture of the view
I saw, copper hills and sage under a canopy of clouds building upon themselves in the valley.

鈥淣o, of the road.鈥�

I didn鈥檛 say, 鈥淭here鈥檚 nothing there.鈥� But, there was nothing there.

鈥淲ait, you missed it,鈥� he said.

鈥淢issed what?鈥�

鈥淭ake it when it鈥檚 absolutely straight.鈥�

In that instant I鈥檓 a child again loaded into the back of our brown-panel station wagon with my siblings, dressed in pajamas and listening to the 8-track tape of Alvin and the Chipmunks. Dad would drive the 717 miles from Ely to Colorado Springs where both sets of our grandparents lived. We stopped only for meals. For hours I would stare at the stretched-out road and unbroken sky.

鈥淭ake another picture,鈥� Zach said a few minutes later.

The road ahead was perfectly straight, disappearing into sand and low hills miles away. There were no cars, no buildings, no signs. I breathed easier than I had all spring.

鈥淭hat straight road, surrounded by a hundred miles of space, I meditate on that. That鈥檚 the place I go when I鈥檓 stressed,鈥� I told him.

He nodded and smiled, not knowing, or maybe he did, that he was driving toward an afternoon with nothing better to do than read to his mother the bit about the horse from a dusty paperback.