I’ve had many interests over the years, and lots of odd bits of trivia float through my brain. One evening in particular, a few of those bits came together to get me out of a small jam.
A bunch of us had gone to a get-together after work, at someone’s house up near Alpine NJ. It was an interesting evening, and when my friend Martha got ready to leave I took that as my cue to leave as well.
So as both of us were walking to our cars, we realized that we weren’t really sure where we in fact were, nor how to get home. It was daylight when we got there, but it was at that point a clear but dark night – hardly any streetlights.
I had a general sense of where we were – Alpine is a town on the Hudson River, north of the office which was right next to the George Washington Bridge. So if we headed south and east, all roads would lead to the Bridge.
We New York City dwellers have a habit of capitalizing things – the Bridge, the Avenue, the City. We know what we’re talking about, and if you don’t that’s your problem.
So, leading the way, we left the party and headed down the street. Now, I’m imagining what Martha was thinking… we drive down to a corner, I get out and look up, then get back in the car and continue driving to another corner, then get out and look up, etc. Eventually, and not too terribly long after, we found our way back to the office.
I later confided my approach to Martha, to her amusement: I was looking for the North Star. As I said, south and east would take us to the office so I kept making turns that went one way or the other.
Hell, it worked, didn’t it?