One of the ideas my father had been entertaining for years, and had been asking me about frequently recently, was selling my company to him and joining him and my brothers. I’d gotten a lot of press within the computer world recently for creating a new app that was snatched up by Google. Not as much money as some apps were being purchased for, but a nice chunk of change. Coupled with the fact that I was still renting the small apartment I’d been in for the last few years, owned my car outright, and spent most of my time with my nose either in a laptop or in a book, I had zero debt and a sizable savings account. Saving for what, I didn’t know, but saving I was.

For a rainy day? For something exactly like what had just dropped into my lap by a mysterious phone call from across the land, telling me that my life had changed and if I was adventurous enough to take a chance, everything could change?

Back to the present. A present where, if my father couldn’t convince me to sell my business to him, he was still going to tell me how to run it. Or how I was not running it correctly, as so many fathers do.

“Dad, I love you. I love you all. But I’m heading out to Mendocino. I might be back in a few weeks, ready to sell off the land and the house and everything else, but for now? I’m going. And not making any decisions beyond that.”

That conversation had ended in grumbles and gruff agreements on both sides.

My mother’s argument was of a different tactic, but no less strategic. My mother lived perpetually in the land of Hopeless Romantic.

“You know, I just have a good feeling about this, Vivvie. I can’t say exactly why, just that I have a good feeling.” She was perched on my bed, helping me pack. Which meant making suggestions about certain clothing items that she thought would be more flattering and appropriate for the trip.

“I have a good feeling too, Mom. Is it weird that I’m excited about something that’s the result of someone dying? Is that terrible?”

“It’s not terrible, sweetie. It’s life. You didn’t really know Maude; even your aunts and I didn’t. We tried to reach out, to get her to move east to be closer to family, but— Not that red one, sweetie. It washes you out.” The red sweater went back into the closet. “And, besides, she loved that house. She always said they’d carry her out feet first. Not the yellow one, sweetie. Makes you look jaundiced.” The T-shirt was replaced by a pink one.

“Feet first! Ew, that’s f**king morbid.” I shivered slightly. I’d be in her house soon.

“Vivvie! Language. Besides, that’s how old people talk. They don’t think of it as morbid; they’re just being obstinate. ‘Feet first,’ she’d say whenever someone would suggest maybe she should think about moving into a retirement community. That’s a pretty one. Green has always been a good color for you, especially with your eyes.”

“Mom, I’m not going to a garden party.”

“Well, it doesn’t hurt to be colorful, no matter the occasion. Now, where are those cute sandals I brought you last week? You have such cute, tiny feet, Vivvie, I wish you’d stop burying them in those combat boots. Who knows who you’re going to meet out there! Why you could meet The One! A nice man with a good job and . . .”

I tuned out all her nice-man talk. I knew what I was hoping for out there. And it had nothing to do with nice . . .

So now I stood at the curb at the airport, surrounded by suitcases and duffel bags, ready to head west. I had a new romance novel downloaded to my Kindle for the five-hour flight, and a bubbling excitement at embarking on my very own adventure, just like the ones in my favorite books.

Bring it.

I’m pretty sure that in my romance novels, the heroine always arrives at her new destination fresh and unwrinkled, smelling of gardenias and excitement.

I arrived at San Francisco International Airport with swollen ankles and a T-shirt covered in marinara sauce from an in-flight argument with a chicken parm. I smelled like recycled airplane air. I was exhausted and cranky from staying up late with last-minute packing, and annoyingly horny due to my marathon read of Loins of Endearment.

I struggled to load my luggage into a cart, then struggled to get it onto the rental car bus, and then struggled to load it into the freaking golf-cart-size car they gave me. I don’t know where the midsized SUV I’d reserved had disappeared to, but at this point I would have driven a scooter to Mendocino. I just wanted to get there.

Firing up the putt-putt-mobile, I consulted my GPS, turned on some tunes, and hit the freeway. And then got stuck in traffic. Then hit the open road! Then more traffic.

Determined to keep my adventurous spirit intact, I rolled down the windows to breathe in that California air. Certain that it would be laced with flowers and sun, I was surprised when it smelled the same as Pennsylvania. But no matter. I was here! Aaaand back in traffic again.

Two hours later, I finally saw signs of the shoreline. The state highway began to wiggle back and forth along the coast; I started noticing tiny slivers of peekaboo blue. Rocks rose majestically out of the water, cliffs sprang up and out toward the deep blue water. The Pacific looked angry, crashing against the shore as though it was taking it personally. I found it invigorating; it could thrash itself as much as it wanted to. I loved the sea spray it created; the hidden caves bubbling the water back out as quickly as it was pushed in.

As I neared the seaside town at a grandmotherly pace of forty-seven miles per hour (thank you, weenie car), I decided that it was a blessing to have to go slow. To take in the beautiful surroundings, to not have anywhere in particular to go—and I’d get there when I got there. It was liberating, it was freeing. I had a devil-may-care feeling: I could go anywhere, be anything I wanted—