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Pardon me, boys, but if you’ll just step out of my way, I’ll go get lost on the next street over.

LIFE IN THE FAST LANE

Confessions of a GPS Dummy

Author/Editor, Carol McClain Craver

My phone won’t talk to me. It will talk to my husband in three voices, his choice. but it clams up when it knows I’m lost. Maps is the answer to my navigational needs. That’s what my advisors say. “It’s your own private guide. Depend on it. Use it, Mom!” The last time I did that, I ended up on a winding residential road at night cruising past groups of young men leaning on cars and drinking from cans. Maybe they were some kind of neighborhood watch. They sure kept an eye on me.

But, I can’t be the only one failing at Maps. Others must have troubled relationships with technology, too. I’d feel so much better if I knew that to be true.

I’ve tried to mend fences. I really have. Instead of snarling at the lifeless phone in my hand, or saying things even soldiers shouldn’t say, I pull over and tap the little picture of the megaphone, for the millionth time, and a woman’s smokey voice coos, “Unmute.”

Hotdog! I’m back in business! I pull back out into traffic and drive. If only Silent Sal will put down her cigarette and tell me which way to turn. But, alias. No. She’s not speaking to me. I finally find my way to my destination and back home in the dark, without meeting anymore young men with cans along the way.

With my phone on the ottoman beside my bare feet, I settle in for a tet-a-tet. House dress, glass of wine, and a TV remote in my hand, I’m ready for a meaningful evening with the man I love. As he looks into my eyes and asks that all important question, “Do you want to watch Jeopardy or can I watch the game?” my phone vibrates and speaks right up. “Your destination is on the left,” she says. But, hey, I could have told you that.