I laughed when my sister-in-law, Brooke, recently posted a hysterical rant on Facebook in which she tried to understand how her teenage daughter, who has lived her whole life in the same place, still can’t find her way around town.
“So…Madison has a permit,” Brooke said. “Terrifying.”
It seems that when my dear niece, Madison, attempted to explain where the mall was, her description sounded something like “it was by one road that was by another road, and then you go that way and you will get to the mall.”
“WHAT!!!???!!!” said her mother. “Heaven help us all!!!”
According to Brooke, her daughter thinks that since her phone has GPS, everything is fine.
Yes, those are the three little letters that explain why maps have become obsolete: GPS.
Ever since the year 2000 when the Global Positioning System became free, public and very popular, a new generation of earth inhabitants has become Rand-McNally illiterate.
I completely understand why. Instead of opening up a paper map the size of a picnic table to figure out where you’re going, how cool is it to just pull out a nifty, little phone, gently touch the screen, and listen to a soothing robotic voice tell you exactly how to get to your destination.
The downside is that cell phones have become so ubiquitous that most kids can barely stop texting, even when they are operating a motor vehicle.
“Don’t text and drive.”
This public service announcement is a vital reminder for kids who may not realize how dangerous it is to drive distracted. It’s also an important reminder for those of us who might remember driving a moving car with a paper map spread out on the steering wheel.
Obviously, it doesn’t take a cell phone to be senseless.
I thought of Madison again a few days ago when I was running on the trails and came across a mother and her daughter, who was actually holding a paper map and was trying very hard to figure out what she was supposed to do with it.
“Did we just go left?” the girl puzzled.
Even though the mom looked as prepared as a Girl Scout leader with her knapsack and hiking boots, I still asked, “Do you need help?”
“Oh no,” she replied. “I know where we are. I just want her to learn.”
I smiled and kept running.
Wow. This mom had the guts to teach her daughter to use a real paper map that was unconnected to the Internet, cyberspace or any kind of text-ready device. I was impressed.
Of course, I’m not sure if her daughter appreciated this lesson in ancient navigational techniques practiced by a parent who might have learned to type on a weird machine called a typewriter. But at least she was trying.
No matter how hard it was for the poor girl to figure out where she was on that map, one thing is for sure. If I asked, I bet she could definitely tell me where the mall was.
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Ann K. Howley is the award-winning author of Confessions of a Do-Gooder Gone Bad.
Please visit her website at http://annkhowley.com/#about-ann