Of the Handiness of Directions by Konnie Enos

 

Not long ago I came across someone’s description of their mother-in-law’s inability to remember right and left or the cardinal positions. This description brought back memories.

My husband, and at least one of our children, cannot see a map in their head. Because they can’t, they have difficulty remembering how to get to places they’ve been multiple times.

My husband has crisscrossed the town we were living in to run a few errands. Errands I could have done by making a well-planned loop to every place I needed to go, getting me back home in whatever amount of time I had.

My husband would pass places he needed to go while going to someplace else he needed to go. Once he was driving my brother to run some errands one of which was taking my brother to his bank. I could have done all errands in about an hour. My husband took at least three, including passing said bank FOUR times before he finally stopped. My brother was furious and refused to ride with my husband ever again.

I took a little more persuading. The experience that finally got me to take over the driving, or at least make sure I could map out our route was when our two oldest were in grade school. I told my husband I had errands to run and he decided he did too so we should just go together. Due to our daughters arriving home from school, we had about two hours.

He drove. He also ended up crisscrossing the town. (He didn’t let me dictate where we went next at any time during this.)

Two hours later I had to call my brother to get the girls off the bus since we weren’t home yet. Thankfully his kids rode the same bus and my girls had to walk past his place to get home. We were at least another hour getting home.

The infuriating part is I knew I could have done all the errands in half the time, and he knew when we needed to be home by.

He did things like that so often that I started doing the driving and I rarely let him do errands with me. If we must do them together, I’m mapping our route because I’m not wasting time.

Another thing he’s done before GPS was readily available, is call me from wherever he was saying, “I’m lost.”

“Okay, where are you?”

“I don’t know. I’m lost.”

I had to patiently ask him for landmarks or to take note of a street sign he was passing then try to figure out what direction he was heading without him knowing that fact. Once I’d established where he was, I could give him directions to get home or to wherever he’d been going. Before GPS, this happened regularly. Now he generally turns his GPS on whenever he gets in the car unless one of us is with him to give directions.

Now, as I said, at least one of our children is unable to map things out in their head and remember how to get from point A to point B.

When our youngest daughter got her learner’s permit she needed my directions to get to places she’s been multiple times. Her excuse was she’d never paid attention as a passenger. When she kept needing directions to places she’d driven to several times I figured out she takes after her dad. The big difference is she can still manage to drive around without getting lost or wasting time backtracking. Yes, she has GPS but I don’t think she relies on it as much as her dad does.

Of course, neither of them have any trouble remembering which hand is right or left.

That would be me. I can’t tell you the number of times I was giving my husband directions and I’d tell him to turn left, or right, and when he went to do so I’d tell him it was the wrong direction. I knew which way to go, I just repeatedly mixed up left and right.

Now, in the story I read about the directionally challenged mother-in-law, they reminded her of which was left or right by giving such hints as “you know, the hand you write with”.

Such hints would only confuse me. (I’m ambidextrous.)

The solution in my family was “this-away” (right, as in towards me the passenger) and “that-away” (obviously towards the driver, left). My kids grew up with this and still use it.

Also, I’m perfectly fine with cardinal directions. It’s just that left and right thing that trips me up.

But since members of my family can’t do it, I always wonder who can “see” the map in their head and who can’t.

What about you?

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.