Anyone who has ever driven with me or ridden with me knows one thing, I am terrible at directions. I may have driven the same route a million times and may know the area inside out and backwards, but I can somehow always manage to get lost. Maybe it has to do with the fact that I grew up in a small town (not 2 stoplights small, that was my college years, but surrounded by cornfield small none-the-less). It meant that there weren't as many streets to get lost on, and the highways didn't need to be learned because there really were only two ways to go - out of town, or into it. So I chalk up my lack of a sense of direction to not ever having had to need one. But truth be told I have needed one ever since leaving college (I wasn't kidding about the 2 stop lights). I needed it when living in Milwaukee, in North Carolina (it has an inner and outer beltline - no north, south, east or west), and California (now there is a place you better know your freeway system). I need one, but I just don't have one. If you really want to have fun with me, move me to a foreign country where I cannot ask for directions when lost, the rules of the road are different and Jenny has not been uploaded her Santiago software yet (yes, my GPS is named Jenny - as in Jenny from the Block - since she knows all the blocks). Once there, give me a car and tell me I have to be somewhere in 20 minutes and let the fun begin.
Since I have moved many times in my life you think I would have some tricks of the trade on how to acclimate myself quickly and learn the roads. You would be wrong. I have tried everything. I tried learning which way is actually north and which is west but I still can't read a compass worth a darn. I have tried navigating by street names but by the time I can read the sign I am usually well past the point of being able to turn left, or right. I am a bit better at navigating by landmarks which might be a throwback to my small town days - turn left at the red barn with the American flag painted on it and when you get to the end of that soybean field, turn right. I remember the landmark, but then forget what to do next. Is is a left? Go straight? Pull in and get a coffee and cruller? My mom found this out the hard way while she was here. We were trying to get to the store and we found our landmark at the intersection, just where it was supposed to be. We took a right, and ended up right back at our landmark. Hmmmm, ok so what now. If you are me, you turn right again swearing that they moved the road since last time you did this. It couldn't possibly be that I was wrong. Of course you know what happened - we ended up right back where we started. At this point, the coffee and cruller is looking pretty good instead of trying to find the store, but darn it, we need groceries. So this time I went straight, for a couple of miles. Realizing that my next landmark should have been spotted by now, I make a U-turn and head back. Now I really need that coffee, maybe with an added kick, but it's only 10 am and we still need those groceries. Now, by my astounding powers of deduction, I realize the only way I haven't gone is left. So left it is.
I tell this story because it really is typical of what happens, A LOT, when I move to a new city. I just get turned around and mixed up and it takes me forever to figure it all out. I have lived in places for years and still only know one way to get somewhere. I can't figure out how streets connect to each other. And here in Santiago it is so much worse. There are a million one way streets and the rules of the road aren't even the same, so now instead of using all of my brain power to remember how to get there, I have to use half of it to remember the new rules of the road and try getting there without getting arrested. Each time I pull up to a light I have to remember not only which way to go, but if I can turn right on red (no, not unless a sign is posted stating you can), if I can turn left on green (in some cases yes, in some only if there is an arrow - haven't figured out how I am supposed to know which case it is) or if the street is one way and if it is, does it go the way I want it to? And I must make decisions quickly. I am in South America after all and that means driving fast and very closely to the car next to you and in front of you. It does benefit me in the fact that I can change lanes often without blinkers and by cutting off the guy next to me - he will think of me as assertive not the other ass word. I can create a new lane if I just happen to need to turn right, but there is already someone in the right hand turn lane. And if I really want to, I can head the wrong way down a one way street if it is more convenient for me. But even learning the new rules of the road won't get me to the right place, I still have to know which streets to take to get there.
I am doing ok. I can get to the store, a couple of malls and MadHatter's school without too much thought. Don't ask me to get from the mall to MadHatter's school, or from the store to the mall without having to go home and start from square one but it's not bad for having been here for less than 2 months. I hope to someday be able to head into downtown without having to bring flares with me so B will know where to find me. Good thing I have a sense of adventure or I would never leave the house. I will get it down, probably just in time to move out of here but that is the way it always goes for me. But it's almost better that way. When I do get it figured out I seem to think I am capable of giving people directions, and this is not the case. If I ever give you directions and I SWEAR I know where I am going and have done it a million time and you need to turn right at the next corner, please, for the love of Pete, turn left.
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