If Callie Feyen tells you to go to a coffee shop, you go. The woman has a sixth sense when it comes to finding fantastic places to consume caffeine.

You’ll commit to it early in the day, when you find yourself with a grey afternoon of hanging clouds and scattered rains. You’ll encounter traffic, because this is DC, and the highways are never as clear as Google Maps make them seem. You’ll wonder if you’re being ridiculous. You’ll very nearly turn around. But the idea of going home to chores and the same furniture you always sit on will keep you driving west. You’ll have the right music playing, and soon you’ll realize your shoulders feel a little lighter.

You’ll walk in the door of Trinity House and a smile will break out immediately; this building was meant to have a coffee shop within its walls. The floors creak loudly as your steps take you to the kitchen in back,full of food and drink made just for grey Saturdays like this one. You’ll look at the menu and know you need tea and a grilled cheese, and soon you’ll have both and it will be just as comforting as you hoped.

You’ll sit on the mustard yellow couch in the corner, near the window. You’ll read a little as you eat and collect your thoughts.Then you’ll settle in to write; you’ll try to wrap words around the vague calm resting across your back. Your pen won’t stop for a while, because this place makes you think about what beauty is and how peace and grace come in the moments when you most need but least expect them.

Before you’re ready it will be time to leave. You’ll hesitate and think about staying longer, but you’ll remember the drive is an hour long, and that time to rest in the quiet of roads through mountains is another gift today is waiting to give you. So you’ll drive on one-lane highway for miles, and it will take you past hills with hay bales placed just so, and in the background, mountains sporting little wisps of smoke from chimneys hidden behind pine trees. You’ll think of the word “glory”, and you’ll gasp with joy, even if that is cliche.

The road will widen from one lane to four, and you’ll start wishing you hadn’t left. But you can’t turn around, so instead you’ll cup memories of the day in your hands and remind yourself of last night’s prayer filled with quiet nouns: peace; contentment; calm; rest. You’ll think maybe this is God’s way of listening to you, and then you’ll smile.