All Mapped Out

Today

What with postcodes, satnav, and our very obvious position opposite the old brewery, you'd think we'd be easy to find. Not so. Yet again today, a van driver called us on his mobile to get us to talk him in. 

These days it seems that people not only can't read maps, they've also entirely lost their sense of direction.

In My Day

I've always loved reading maps and somehow always assumed that other people could read them. This is not only not true, but people also don't like to admit it. They will gamely offer to navigate, holding the map upside down on the wrong page, while the driver struggles to deal with roundabouts and traffic with absolutely no idea of where they are.

I think it must have been about 1989. Paul's mum was visiting us. One day we thought it might be fun to do the Bath "Ghost Walk" - one of those city tours which tell you a lot about the city while trying to spook you with various creepy tales. We were both working and it seemed like a good idea for Mum to have a day in Bath before we had our evening jaunt.

Mum and I arrived in Bath. I took her up to the Flare offices, which were pretty central, got her a cup of tea and discussed the day. We agreed to meet for lunch. I gave her a street map of Bath, marked our location, mentioned some good places to visit and turned her loose.

I got on with my day's work, hoping that Mum was having a good time. There's plenty to see in Bath, sights are well-signposted and there are also lots of nice shops to browse. About half-an-hour before we were due to be reunited, a call was put through to me from the police. Apparently Mum had wandered round, completely unable to read her map or work out which way was up. Either she accidentally stumbled on the police station or a policeman and asked for help.

There was nothing for it; I cancelled my afternoon's appointments, collected the panicking Tricia and spent the afternoon calming her down preparatory for the evening walk, which she much enjoyed. What did become obvious, without much probing, was that she had no idea how to read a map; I could have given her a map of Timbuktu without her knowing the difference, but she was ashamed to admit it.

I am rather sorry now for my presumption, as well as forgetting that Mum was seventy-six, so unlikely to be able to learn new tricks.

What I have just done is ask the council to add a road sign saying "Manor Place", which is officially the bit of the High Street where we live, in an attempt to help panicking van delivery staff in the future.