That's Life: Which Way Do I Go?
"'You couldn't find your way out of a paper bag," my father said to me time and again. And I have not learned to tell west from east or north from south in the 20 years since Father passed away. When people give me directions to their home, some have spoken "Feetese," which I basically do not understand.
"Down the road about 150 feet make a left turn," they say. While I know a ruler is one-foot long, it is a mystery to me how far away 150 feet is from where I stand.
As for knowing the address of the house I am heading for, that information has proven useless more often than not. What good is it to know the address if it is not displayed on the house?
It is only by the process of elimination and the kindness of strangers that I find unidentified houses. "Is this Number x?" I ask as I go door to door. Once, someone said with a smile. "It's across the street - the white house." As my father would have said, "You could have fallen over it."
Hunting for a house where I was to conduct an interview recently, I followed the interviewee's instructions and traveled up a certain road in Williamstown which I have not been on in years. "The house is on the right after you pass a bunch of mailboxes," the interviewee had said and then had warned, "If you come to a horse farm, you've gone too far."
Before long, I became nervous as I surmised I was alone on that road. I had been driving about 20 minutes when I noticed a bunch of mail boxes. I stopped at the only house in sight and knocked and then banged on the front door and side door. "This can't be the place," I muttered. "No one is home."
I was about to drive away when a white-haired woman ran to me, calling out "Are you looking for me?" I explained that I was trying to locate a house numbered ... "Oh," the woman said, "that's on the new road. Turn around and go back aways, then make a left turn onto that road. The house you want is the second one on the left."
Well the "new road," was a narrow, winding dirt road I was not eager to navigate so I decided to make sure the nice white-haired woman was not mistaken. I pulled over at the side of the road, took my cell phone from my handbag and dialed the interviewee's phone number, but no one answered my call. All I heard was that familiar message: "Leave your name and number and I'll call you back."
Determined not to allow fear to keep me from fulfilling a commitment, I mustered my courage to face the unknown. But my courage was short lived, as when I turned the ignition key, the car did not start and I envisioned that in a week or so the local newspapers would carry the headline "Skeleton of woman discovered in car."
I climbed out the car, hoping if I stretched my legs and breathed some fresh air, I would be able to regain my composure. When my mind stopped racing, I realized that, if necessary, I could call AAA for roadside assistance. But first I again tried to start the car. The purring of the engine was music to my ears.
As I was driving up the dirt road, the weather forecast I had heard earlier echoed in my ears: "Severe thunderstorms accompanied by large hail and high winds." Looking at the forest surrounding me, I thought, "If one of these trees is struck by lighting and falls on my car, I'm a goner."
When I finally spotted a house on the dirt road, I was as delighted as I imagine Christopher Columbus' crew was when they sighted land. The house, however, was on the right side of the road so I continued driving until I spotted a house on the left side.
At the house on the left side, I knocked on the front door, once, twice, thrice, to no avail. I was sitting in my car, pondering how I would make my way out of what seemed to be "No Man's Land." Hmm, I had taken a left turn when I was back-tracking on the main road so when I wanted to drive back home, I would have to ... I wished I had inherited my father's infallible sense of direction.
"Can I help you?" a young woman called out as she opened the front door of the house. I told her of my dilemma, and admitted that I felt as if I was in the wilderness. "Well you are," she said. Then she told me the house I was trying to reach was farther up the road. "It is on the right," she added.Since some people had said the house was on the right side of the road and some others led me to believe it was on the left side, I began wondering if the interviewee lived in a motor home and drove from side to side whenever she grew bored with looking at the same trees.
As it turned out, the house was on the left of the dirt road, and when I arrived, the interviewee greeted me as if I were a long-lost friend. By then, she may have truly given me up for lost or a no-show. She offered me a cold drink, but I said, "No thank you." Thirsty or not, I was bent on conducting the interview and getting back home to "civilization" as soon as possible.
Luckily, I was safe at home when the thunderstorm hit, turning day to night. I transcribed my notes in longhand rather than typing them on the computer. After all, if I used the computer when there was lightning, the next day's headlines might read: "Woman electrocuted while using computer."
