Member-only story
“If you don’t know where you’re going, any road’ll take you there.”
- Paraphrase of exchange between Alice and Cheshire Cat in “Alice in Wonderland” by Lewis Carroll (1865)
I don’t know that I’m more directionally challenged than the average person. On an accelerated study program as a youngster, I missed geography in grade school. I sometimes wonder if that factors into what I at times perceive to be my inferior ability to find my way to a given destination.
I once got so lost at night in New Orleans I paid someone $5 to help with directions, only to discover my destination was right around the corner from where I’d been. It was after that episode that I acquired a collapsible Bausch and Lomb 5x magnifying lens (in Louisiana I actually had a map but couldn’t read it, the print was so small), which I keep in my fanny pack.
An old (and I do mean old; it may yet find its way into the Smithsonian) Thomas map guide yet resides in the darkness of my car trunk. I’ve not used it for years, and may never again. But I keep it as backup. Just in case.
At a recent holiday dinner gathering, talk (thankfully, at least it wasn’t about politics or religion, two topics guaranteed to generate more heat than light) turned to Tesla. Not the man, the car.
