He said, she said, and they both have holes in the middle

I am terrible at directions. Anyone who knows me will tell you this. Somewhere in my education I missed out on geography and direction. The geography portion drove my mother nuts. She asked me once what I pictured in my head when I heard the word, "Ethiopia", a country heavily in the news in my day. I told her the truth; the word, "Ethiopia". To her credit, she just walked away from me and screamed in another room.

The direction portion drove my entire family nuts. My father took it in stride and tried to work with me to no avail. My mother and my brother would just yell at me and make me feel stupid. "How can you not know where you are?" they'd exclaim in utter disbelief. My nephew, he then at the age of three, could find his way around town better than I could. Ask my sister about the time I got us horribly lost in my hometown one night after leaving a movie theater, and she will burst out laughing. A jaunt home that should have taken us ten minutes instead took us over an hour, and is now part of our family lore.

Nothing has helped. I am a learner who pictures everything in her head for processing. Thus when words like "south" and "north" are used, I have no obtainable picture like I do when I hear "left" and "right". (I see arrows, if you're interested) I'm one of those people who give directions like Dirks Bentley does in the song Good Directions; ..."way up yonder past the caution light, there's a little country store with an old Coke sign...a left will take you to the interstate and a right will bring you right back here to me." I mean, people, that's a picture one can grab a hold of in her head. I've resigned myself to the fact that I'm hopeless when it comes to getting from point A to point B without memorization or, hello, new world, electronic assistance.

Yesterday, during my weekly breakfast with my friend, Jim, he started telling me about a Japanese restaurant not far from our houses. Jim lives to the right south of me, and he asked if I knew where the restaurant was located. I didn't and he felt the need to expound on its location.

Jim: "You go down to the corner, you know, where the Publix, is on the right."

Immediately, in my brain, I left my house, driving in my van( in my head), and took a left out of my street. I don't know why, but I did. He wasn't specific about that, and that's where I went in my mind. I went left and down to the corner where there is a Publix on the right side of the road. Note: Read this to understand that Publix is everywhere in my vicinity. 

Jim: "You know, where the bagel shop is on the left?"

At the same corner, where I was traveling in my head, there is a Panera Bread. I naturally assumed he meant this bagel shop, and so I nodded, wondering where he could possibly be going from here since I knew of no place where a Japanese Restaurant could be hiding.

Jim: "Okay, well in that same strip mall right before you get to the bagel shop, right after the light, is that coffee shop."

What? That stopped me. Light? There is a light after I turn out of my subdivision, but it is closer to my neighborhood than it is to the Publix and bagel shop, and thus confusion set in. Immediately, knowing myself, I made some inquires.

Me: "Wait. What light? There isn't a light."
Jim: "Yes, there is."
Me: "Okay, wait, start again. I go past Publix, right? You're talking about the light after Publix?"
Jim: "No. You go down the road until you get to the light and the Publix."

I tried to picture this, but it wasn't happening. That's when it dawned on me that I might have turned the wrong way out of my subdivision.

Me: "Wait. You're talking about the Publix at the corner of such and such road?"
Jim: "Yes. That's the Publix closest to my house."
Me: "I'm sorry. I went the wrong way. I was down at the corner of here and there."
Jim: "Why would I be talking about that way? My Publix is down the other way."
Me: "Okay, well you didn't say "your Publix". And that's my Publix too, but I just went the other way. Wait. What bagel shop is down that way?"
Jim: "It's across from Publix. In that strip mall after the light."

And suddenly I got it. I knew exactly where he was, but the shop he was referring to was, for me, a donut shop. Suddenly I was laughing until I was crying.

Jim: "What's so funny about that?"
Me: "That's the difference between a skinny guy and a fat girl. You refer to it as a bagel shop, but I refer to it as the donut place. That's hilarious."

And I was off laughing again. As were the people around us who had been listening to our conversation. My companion didn't find the humor in it. He thought I was nuts for traveling in the wrong direction in my head.

Me: "Yeah, well, you should have said south. I would have known then."

That was partially true. I have learned and memorized "north" and "south" out of my neighborhood, but honestly, if he had said "donut shop" instead of "bagel shop" I would have known I had gone the wrong way and would have turned around...in my head.

Jim: "Well, I said, "bagel shop" because you're on a diet. So there."

He always has to have the last word.