Reverend Jim: what's good to eat and cheap on DNT?
Corporate Jester: what stretch of DNT?
Reverend Jim: um.
Reverend Jim: north of 635…
Reverend Jim: south of as much as possible.
As much as I despise Dallas, at times, I take pride in having a good working knowledge of its highways, freeways, and major roads. I don't claim to know everything. There are plenty of people that know a lot more than I do. But I can get around. If you dropped me off in some remote part of the city, blindfolded all the way there, with minimal amounts of traveling in the wrong direction, I could find my way home. Something about that makes me happy, and proud.
When I go on road trips (not 6 hours drives… road trips… long distance) I bring a map, just to be safe. I plot my course before hand, and plan everything out. I learn all the major freeways that I will pass, and where they lead. I learn all the city loops, and all of the bypasses. And then, I get in the car and I put the map and all my directions away. It's a lot more fun that way.
In July of 1999 I returned to California for my 21st birthday after 6 years of living in Texas. I had lost touch with most of my friends there, and those that I still talked to had moved away. However, I decided to go anyway, and met an online friend there in Long Beach, about 2-3 hours out from where I used to live. One of the best parts of that trip was my attempt to get her to all three of my old houses, and all of my favorite hiking spots without a map or directions. The last time I was there I wasn't old enough to drive and rarely left to confines of my city. I made it, eventually, but it certainly wasn't easy. We took a lot of wrong turns, and I second guessed myself a lot when I shouldn't have.
The most amazing thing was driving East on I-10 and having certain landmarks trigger flashbacks of driving down the same roads and going to the same places. That was the only way I found it. As we drove by an exit, I would get an image in my head of actually getting off on that exit, so we'd get off on the next one and make our way back to see if my mind would open the door to the next piece of the puzzle.
