Directionally Deficient

A few days ago, my boyfriend’s mom asked me where I was going to be living next year. When I told her The Royal Lex, she seemed confused and asked where it was at. I was like oh you know, its at the corner of the street that runs in front of the hospital. She looked even more confused. My friends would know what I was talking about, but why couldn’t she? Then it hit me, maybe I should have given her some street names. Shortly, I came to another realization — I didn’t know the street names…

At first, I felt kind of ignorant that I couldn’t tell my boyfriend’s mom the name of the street I was living on next year. I mean shouldn’t I know these details? Honestly, I had a visual map of Lexington in my head and just ignored street names. I could take you there, but not give you specific directions on how to get there. Why is this?

I came to realize how much I rely on my “Maps” app. I punch in my location, and it almost always gets me to my destination. It speaks to me and tells me when to turn, so I guess I’ve grown accustom to ignoring street names because its much simpler to just “turn right in 500 ft.”

But, what if something happened and I lost connection and couldn’t use my app? Could I even use a real map to navigate myself? Or, what if the app takes me in the absolute wrong direction? How would I ever steer myself back on track?

The possibility of “what if” is sort of frightening. I’ve realize that my dependency on my Maps app would not get me out of these “what if” situations. Lately, I’ve been taking measures to help myself actually learn street names and become less dependent on the app.

My friends and I like to drive around after a stressful week. Instead of using our app to take us to somewhere specific, we just drive. I’ve actually learned a lot by taking the time to drive without an app guiding my way. I’m discovering what streets connect with one another, which ones have my favorite restaurants, and things of that nature. Believe or or not, I’ve actually become pretty great at navigating through Lexington and even gave specific directions to someone for probably the first time ever.

Long story short, directions aren’t that hard, you just have to step out of your comfort zone, turn the app (or GPS) off, and drive!