Higher Ground

The clock was ticking against us as we threw our stuff in the van. Missoula was already fading in the rearview mirror, the late afternoon sun slanting through the windshield. We were pushing it, really pushing it, but something in my gut said we just had to go. Sometimes you need to escape even when logic says it’s too late, you know? The rational part of my brain kept muttering about schedules and time constraints, but there was this stronger pull, this necessity to just… get away.

The road unfurled ahead, winding through pine-covered hills as shadows lengthened across the asphalt. Every mile marker we passed felt like a small victory against the odds. There was this unspoken urgency between us, this shared understanding that we were racing against some invisible deadline.

Back at work, the sudden changes from this department restructuring… more accurately, its absorption; are throwing everything into chaos, like too many unexpected stimuli all at once. “Autism.” It’s not a small word for me; it’s a universe of different ways my brain processes the world. What I used to dismiss as “being dramatic” was actually sensory overload, the fluorescent lights feeling like they’re drilling into my skull, the overlapping office noises becoming unbearable. And what I wrongly labeled “diffrent tendencies” was the crushing social exhaustion after trying to navigate endless unspoken rules and expectations. It takes so much energy just to process social interactions and mask my natural responses. Now, even the thought of my carefully constructed patterns and routines being disrupted feels viscerally wrong, like my internal sense of order is being ripped apart. These routines aren’t just preferences; they’re how I maintain a sense of predictability and manage the overwhelming nature of a world not built for my brain.

Now that I know… you know. It’s like someone handed me a new pair of glasses after decades of squinting. Everything’s clearer, but also overwhelming… all these memories reframing themselves, all these new accommodations to figure out. And trying to explain it to new supervisors who’ve known me for years but never really known me? While the company’s reshuffling everything? It’s like trying to rebuild a house during an earthquake.

The sun was dipping dangerously low as we pulled into the parking lot. “Last gondola in ten minutes!” shouted our friend, an attendant, in a bright vest, already looking ready to call it a day. We scrambled out, grabbing jackets and water bottles, practically jogging to the ticket booth. “You made it by the skin of your teeth”.

The gondola swayed gently as it pulled away from the station, lifting us above the treeline. Below, the world started to shrink… the cars becoming toys, the trails thin ribbons through the dense forest. We sat in reverent silence as the sun began its final descent, painting the sky in impossible shades of orange and pink. The light burst through the glass of our little suspended bubble, catching dust motes that danced between us.

As we ascended higher, then after a small hike descended lower, the tension I’d been carrying. The transition anxiety, the diagnostic processing, the constant masking at work, it all seemed to stay below with the landscape. Up here, suspended between earth and sky, none of it could reach me. The gondola bumped a bit on its rollers, and suddenly there it was. The sun is perfectly framed between two mountain peaks, sending rays out like golden fingers stretching across the valley.

Sometimes the most important journeys happen because you push past that voice saying it’s too late, it won’t work out, why bother. We nearly missed this… this perfect moment, this suspended peace, because it seemed impractical, because the timing was tight. But we made it anyway.

We floated above it all in our glass bubble, watching darkness and light play across the mountains. And I realized that’s what I needed to navigate my changing world below. This is, a reminder that there’s always higher ground to be found when things get overwhelming. Sometimes you just have to make the initiative, even when it seems impossible… especially when it seems impossible.

Sunsets can only be seen when we’re brave enough to race against time and climb anyway.