Since I arrived in Durham, I've had a part-time project I didn't expect or prepare for. No, it has not been stepping up in the house hold and taking care of more day-to-day things and no, it isn't finding work on the side to supplement the income. This side project haunts you every time you go out for milk, run down to the mall or really go anywhere here in the Durham-Raleigh-Chapel Hill megasprawl. Its navigation. I can honestly say that I'd be homeless and astranged from my wife if it wasn't for GPS and Google maps on my cell phone. In trying to find places on my own I think I once ran into the wrong store on accident and managed to get groceries.

Well, I'm writing because I'm finally begining to understand navigation here in Durham and it has taken some serious effort. Let me give you an example of how I've been able to retrain my entire thinking to get from one place to another.

This evening, I wanted to head out to forest hills park and play some frisbee. Our place is just a couple of blocks away from some major freeway and highway interchanges and where I'm headed is to the North and East a couple of miles, so instead of braving the ever twisting, double-backing, shifting surface streets, I head out to the freeway/highway complex. Like I said, I want to head North and East so I know right away to do the opposite... First, I head due North taking the 147 South so that I can connect with highways 15/501 North. I take this East until my exit, then cut sharply across three lanes to pull the hard right I need to make it to the park. Yup. That was for real. On the way home, I naturally want to reverse my directions... home now lies South and West of forest hills park. So, again applying the lessons of opposite thinking, I weave through a few surface streets and hop on to the 15/501 South to head West until I can catch the 147 North, thus continuing my progress South to my exit.

Its that simple. Oh, I forgot to mention one thing. My exit for Morrene Road is labeled Chapel Hill 15/501 South... at least the direction is right. So I take exit 16B to Chapel Hill, then quickly veer left, mergeing with traffic in the leftmost lane to get get out of the exit only for 108B (yes, that would put me right back where I came from heading North on 147 South), go a quarter mile and then merge right to exit 108A and head down a few blocks. I'm writing this account... so I must have made it home.