So Wednesday Travis and I drove to my parents' house in Iowa. Well, their temporary home. They moved this summer to SW Iowa near Omaha, and are currently renting a farm house while their new home is being built.
Now, just to give a bit of background, I have never been that great at reading maps. Remember those basic skills tests they make you take from elementary through high school? With math, science, reading, vocabulary, social studies, and map skills? Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I was always really good at those tests. I always got somewhere between 96-99% and tested way above my grade level...Except for the map tests. I ALWAYS got only about 70% on map tests. This has always been really difficult for me.
However, we had made this drive before and I paid really close attention to the roads. I studied a map before we left, and I had our route memorized. You see, I wanted to have my ipod plugged in for the drive, and the ipod and the GPS cannot be plugged in at the same time.
So finally, we were about 10 miles from Mom and Dad's house and we needed to turn onto J20. I told Travis to keep his eyes peeled for it, and as I said it, we passed the sign. So we turned around, went back, and saw that J20 went only in one direction. This was easy - let's just turn down the road. So we drove and drove and drove. For a REALLY long time. I called my mom to make sure we were headed the right direction, and she said we'd know if we went too far because we'd end up in the town just 5 miles past their house. I felt reassured and Travis told me to ask for their address so we could put it in the GPS. I didn't ask. I told him "No, she said we'd know if we passed it. We must be okay."
So we drove for awhile longer and ended up just outside a town. Except this was not the same town where my parents work. I called my parents to discover I had driven about 20-30 miles in the wrong direction. Apparently there are two separate entrances to J20 - each about a mile apart and heading in opposite directions. Back we went to the other J20 entrance. I was very upset by this point. We have been on the road for over 7 hours already. It's been a long several days. I was tired. I was grumpy. My ego was hurt. I thought I knew where we were going and I took us in the wrong direction and I was too proud to just use the GPS.
And this time we drove and drove and ended up near another town. This time 15 miles past my parents' house in the other direction. Apparently J20 has a third turn that is difficult to see at night, and we missed this one. I was a wreck at this point and Travis insisted on driving. I was sobbing about how incompetent I am and how sorry I was. And wonderful Travis was so patient and didn't care at all that I added a total of 80 miles onto our drive. My dad drove out and met us where we were and we followed him home.
And naturally, everyone made fun of me. I am definitely using the GPS on the drive home.
Now, just to give a bit of background, I have never been that great at reading maps. Remember those basic skills tests they make you take from elementary through high school? With math, science, reading, vocabulary, social studies, and map skills? Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I was always really good at those tests. I always got somewhere between 96-99% and tested way above my grade level...Except for the map tests. I ALWAYS got only about 70% on map tests. This has always been really difficult for me.
However, we had made this drive before and I paid really close attention to the roads. I studied a map before we left, and I had our route memorized. You see, I wanted to have my ipod plugged in for the drive, and the ipod and the GPS cannot be plugged in at the same time.
So finally, we were about 10 miles from Mom and Dad's house and we needed to turn onto J20. I told Travis to keep his eyes peeled for it, and as I said it, we passed the sign. So we turned around, went back, and saw that J20 went only in one direction. This was easy - let's just turn down the road. So we drove and drove and drove. For a REALLY long time. I called my mom to make sure we were headed the right direction, and she said we'd know if we went too far because we'd end up in the town just 5 miles past their house. I felt reassured and Travis told me to ask for their address so we could put it in the GPS. I didn't ask. I told him "No, she said we'd know if we passed it. We must be okay."
So we drove for awhile longer and ended up just outside a town. Except this was not the same town where my parents work. I called my parents to discover I had driven about 20-30 miles in the wrong direction. Apparently there are two separate entrances to J20 - each about a mile apart and heading in opposite directions. Back we went to the other J20 entrance. I was very upset by this point. We have been on the road for over 7 hours already. It's been a long several days. I was tired. I was grumpy. My ego was hurt. I thought I knew where we were going and I took us in the wrong direction and I was too proud to just use the GPS.
And this time we drove and drove and ended up near another town. This time 15 miles past my parents' house in the other direction. Apparently J20 has a third turn that is difficult to see at night, and we missed this one. I was a wreck at this point and Travis insisted on driving. I was sobbing about how incompetent I am and how sorry I was. And wonderful Travis was so patient and didn't care at all that I added a total of 80 miles onto our drive. My dad drove out and met us where we were and we followed him home.
And naturally, everyone made fun of me. I am definitely using the GPS on the drive home.
1 comment:
haha Erika! I know I can't laugh at this post but you are just so cute! but I know the frustration when you can't find the direction and being in an unfamiliar place. Good job though!!!
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