My Aunts and Uncles as well as my family were getting ready to drive to Michigan and there would be 2 full cars. My favorite Uncle was driving one car and I knew I wanted to ride in his car. There was a discussion of what to do if Uncle got lost in the downtown traffic of Chicago on our way so I offered to guide them. They all turned to me as my mother asked me how I knew the directions. Well, we drove to Michigan a lot to see another Aunt & Uncle and I figured I knew the way but Mom and Dad decided that my directions of turning left after you went under the railroad tracks or right by this certain gas station just were not good enough to be counted on. That was the first time that I realized that the way I gave directions was different from most others. The directions were then given verbally to my Uncle using highway numbers, street names, and house numbers. I sat quietly in the middle of the front bench seat beside my favorite Uncle the whole way.
I didn’t think about that little incident for many years. I was always with my parents or somebody else more grown-up than I who knew exactly what we were doing and where we were to go. It wasn’t until I got married and my husband entered dental school that we moved to a new place that neither of us knew. I remembered where my Mama Gent lived and found her house where we spent the night. We used her house as a base to look for our own apartment the next day. After moving into our newly found place in Loma Linda and after having our first daughter, I needed to find a job. That meant getting in the car and going to town for an appointment with an employment agency. I found the agency, they hired me themselves, and I learned one way to my job and one way home. Seemed normal to me and I did it for 2 1/2 years. Finally we settled in Auburn with a new dental practise and me at the front desk. As people called for appointments, they sometimes asked directions and I gave them, my way. ” North on the main drag through Auburn, turn left at the light by the Motel & Quick Stop, go about a block and we are on the left in a group of offices”. Oh, and I would always add that we were “across the street from the Doctors Clinic”, that always cinched it, everybody knew where that was. Nobody ever laughed at my directions or got lost. Then we built a new office clear across town. Now I was having to give new directions as our patients learned our new location. Now it was different directions depending on which direction they were coming but I had my same way of giving directions and never once did anyone have trouble finding us.
One time we went to a dental convention in the middle of San Francisco. Dick was gone all day attending classes and I was alone. I realized that if I went out by myself to find the wonderful shopping that was supposed to be nearby I wasn’t sure I would be able to find my way back to the hotel. How embarrassing that would be. Yes, that was my first realization as an adult that I had a problem with directions. I had a husband who would just look out the car window and say “That’s North, that’s South, over there is such and such….” I didn’t know how he could possibly know this. As I contemplated what to do in San Francisco, I came up with a plan. I would go out the front door of the hotel and keep turning left until I went all the way around the block and returned to my hotel. While on that walk I could see what else was around that might be interesting and make another plan. I did it!!!!! Arriving back at the entrance to the hotel I realized that we were just a block away from a place called Union Square and around the whole square were wonderful big stores to explore, a park to sit in and lots of people to watch. The rest of our time there was full of exploration for me as long as I knew where my hotel was.
Since then, I have watched myself deal with my insecurities about directions and how I handled them. Always parking at the same spot at the Mall or grocery store, driving the same way to the places that I needed to go, even having Dick drive me to someplace new the night before I had to be there so that I could go the next day by myself. I still didn’t really think I was any different from others but my husband did smile to himself when he had to make those special “day before” trips for me. In the Mall, I sometimes explored a store or two that I had already been through because I turned the wrong way and after living in Auburn for almost 30 years, I even got to where I kind of explored on my own because I now knew that I could always find home. I even surprised Dick sometimes, with my knowledge of some of the side street businesses I knew about because of my casual driving. I have been on several trips to Europe and mission trips to South America which could have been terrifying but I was always with others and so I just followed along.
I was explaining this little phenomenon to a friend and she said that her daughter was the same way and that there is a name for it. SPATIAL DISORIENTATION. She said that she knew because her husband was a pilot and all pilots have to be screened for this. She said you could have it diagnosed but it sounded like my problem with directions would qualify as that. Recently, I googled it and found out that it means much more than my small experiences, that it could really be quite serious and pilots, astronauts, divers all have to be tested for this. Can’t say I felt all that much better about it but at least I understood that it described my problem to some degree.
Now, I knew why it drove me nuts when Dick gave me directions to someplace new and then said. “or you could go this way, or this other way or I haven’t tried it yet, but I bet you could take this road.” NUTS, NUTS, NUTS. Tell me one way and when I learn that way THEN give me another way to learn, not all of them at once! My close friends now know my lack of aptitude for directions and carefully make sure I get where I want to go and I appreciate that. Because I have a name for my affliction I don’t feel so embarrassed that others know about it. But I did realize one thing that I don’t think the rest of the world would even think of, I am so tired, my head is full of directions to places I have been and places that I want to find and all those directions are long descriptions rather than what everybody else knows. “N on I 5, take Mall exit and turn right”. When I get to my car to go home, I mentally track my way home so that I will know which way to turn as I leave the parking lot. To me this is a disability that deserves a special cure and my husband thoughtfully purchased one. A Garmin GPS that resides in my car for my use at any time. I can even just have it show a general map of where I am so that I can see what roads are coming up and I can get in the right lane. FOR ME THE ULTIMATE GIFT from a very understanding husband.
Tags: Garmin, Garmin GPS, GPS
