Something happens to me when I leave the city. And I’m not just talking about something insignificant like missing my family or the unbelievably delicious Mexican food I have access to at the 24-hour drive-thru by my house. No, I’m talking about something organic. Something cellular. Something within my body chemistry that knows when I’ve traveled a significant distance away from civilization and I get the heebiest of jeebies. Suddenly I’m overcome with a crippling amount of anxiety and I just can’t deal.

Because I’m smart enough to know better, I try not to do this too often. I know when it’s going to happen, so I try not to put myself in outside-land situations.

I can’t help it if I’m a city girl. When I try to trace this irrational fear of the wilderness back to its origin, I realize just how crazy I am and that it really has no backing.

I have never lived right in the middle of a bustling city. I grew up in the San Fernando Valley, which is merely a suburb of Los Angeles. I never had a bad experience camping. In fact, I don’t even remember ever going camping. And if anyone asks me to go camping nowadays, the uncomfortable feeling I get stems back as far as I can remember. In the summer of 2005 I went to New York City with my grandparents and we stayed in the heart of Manhattan, just a short walk away from Times Square, for four days. I remember staying up late in our room, sitting on the windowsill and looking down at the bustling streets that were just as busy at 3 a.m. as they are at 3 p.m. Somehow, someway, the shouting cab drivers and loud New Yorkers were oddly comforting.

After our near-weeklong romp in the city, we headed upstate to visit family. Driving away from the city was like leaving my childhood pup on the curb behind us and watching its big eyes disappear slowly in the rearview mirror. The further north we drove, the greener everything got. Where most people would feel comfort in nature, I missed the dirt, grime and incessant honking I’d become used to falling asleep to.

We stayed in upstate New York for exactly 24 hours before we headed to the airport. I remember it being the most excruciating and painfully boring 24 hours I have ever experienced. We ate dinner at the most cliché diner, where everyone knew everyone else’s name and when we got home our only form of entertainment was a tired game of Jenga and my grandpa falling asleep anywhere he sat down.

I once had a coworker who lived in Ramona. Driving from my apartment to see her was a trek and a half. I know it isn’t too far from Poway, but that drive was killer. All I saw were canyons and tumbleweeds from the one highway that went through the center of town.

Speaking of which, let’s establish a golden rule: If I can drive up one street and see an entire town, I probably do not want to spend any time there. Even though the small town is only about 45 minutes outside of San Diego, driving there gave me that familiar, uncomfortable feeling. In fact, during my last semester at San Diego Mesa College, I had to write something called a “cultural plunge,” where I had to put myself in an uncomfortable situation and write a paper about it. I chose to dive, headfirst, into that small community just outside of San Diego. I forced myself to stay in that town as long as I could bear it. But, after talking to some little old ladies in a beauty parlor on the corner of Main Street, I knew I had to get out of there, and fast.

My mom’s boyfriend lives in a small mountain community just north of the San Fernando Valley. Just hearing my mom’s directions pained me. When I asked her the best way to describe the area, she said, “It’s not the middle of nowhere, but you can see it from there.”

I could already feel the small-town anxiety setting in. Driving through the canyon into Lake Elizabeth is truly an experience. Once you feel like you’ve driven what feels like 1,000 miles of twists and turns (filled with horse ranches, shooting ranges and endless tumbleweeds, of course) you have to traverse about 30 more.

As I made my way in, I began to visualize every opening scene of every crappy horror movie I had ever seen. I knew if my tire was going to blow out anywhere in the world, it would probably be on my way into this creepy town. If I stopped somewhere to get help, it would be “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” all over again. Even the place we had dinner at, The Historic Rock Inn, felt like a place three of my closest friends and I would step into during our own “Texas” road trip and never leave. We would all be brutally murdered in the town of Lake Elizabeth and none of us would be able to warn future travelers of those sleepy little “foothills have eyes” towns.

Now, being in this town gives me an uncontrollable sense of cabin fever. The nearest form of true civilization is 45 minutes away and I’ve already gone stir crazy. My mom and brother are dancing around the living room to Motown (and because my brother is such a hipster, he wanted to remind everyone that it isn’t Motown, it’s Motown adjacent. Honestly, how annoying.) and I’m longing for the sounds of freeway on-ramp construction that has been going on less than 100 feet away from my front door for the past two weeks.

Get me back to the hustle, the bustle, the noise and the people before I totally and completely lose my mind. Thanks.

—Hayley Rafner is a journalism junior.