Anyone who knows me very well knows that I am directionally impaired. I cannot read maps. I cannot find my car in a parking lot. I cannot follow directions. I cannot find my way out of a building. I cannot find the canned good aisle in the grocery store. I do not know the difference between east, west, north or south. It matters not at all how many times I have visited a particular place, I will not be able to find it again. I have two GPS's that go everywhere with me, and they do me no good. Time and again, when the little lady on the inside tells me to "turn right in .4 miles" I think that she cannot possibly be correct. I feel in my gut that I should turn left. So I do. And I am wrong every time. The little lady inside the GPS heaves a great sigh, and says, "recalculating route." I don't know why I don't believe her. I am never right. But I still insist that my instincts will take me the correct way. So I am always lost. Always lost. Usually late, and quite often out of gas.
A few weeks ago, I needed to go to a district meeting in Magna. I have been to the building where the district meeting was being held on probably a dozen or more occasions. I have driven there myself at least half of those times. I was pretty sure that I could find my way there. I couldn't. I took myself down I-80 west, which was not the road I thought I was on, and amazingly enough it did not have the exit that I was looking for. I tried to put the address into both of my GPS's. One told me there was no such address. The other tried to send me on a trip to New York that would take me 34 hours, and I knew that not only would that be the wrong place, but I would be late to the meeting. So I attempted to find the building myself. When I got to Tooele, Utah, I knew that I had gone too far. Magna is 19 miles left and down from Holladay, where I live. Tooele is 44 miles left and down from Holladay, where I live. Even as directionally impaired as I am I knew that Tooele was not where I wanted to be. So I started going back up and right. After a while, I stopped in a parking lot for a much needed emotional breakdown. I cried for a bit, then called Bruce to find out where I was and how I should get to where I wanted to be. He helped me out, as he always does. Then I started again, and amazingly enough, found the building! After I finished all of my business there, I needed to go to another district meeting in another building in Magna. Smugly, I thought I knew where the second building was. I pulled out of the parking lot and turned right. Many miles later, there were no church buildings in sight, no buildings of any kind in sight, no human beings in sight or signs of any human habitation, and I was fearful that the pavement would soon end. I pulled out my cell phone to call Bruce again, and found there was also no cell phone reception. Close to my second emotional breakdown of the day, I turned the car around and drove back the way I had come. As soon as my cell phone indicated that there was a signal, I stopped the car and called Elder Judd, the Zone Leader for the district I was attempting to find. I knew he was where I wanted to be.
Elder Judd was as patient and kind as he could be. First, he asked me where I was. Since I had no idea, he asked me to drive to the nearest street sign and tell him what it said. When I did that, he responded that our first goal would be to get me back into the mission. Oops. He stayed on the phone with me for the next 20 minutes or so, guiding me step by step. "Do you see a McDonald's on your right? Good, Sister Winn! You're doing really well! Keep going! Now, is there a grocery store on your left? You are going the right way!" It was a little humiliating, but not too much because people have been doing this for me all my life. I just felt sorry for the poor Elder who was thinking that his mission president's wife was certainly more than a little daft and maybe next time he'd just screen my call rather than be on the phone with me all day! At last, I only had to make two more turns to reach my destination. He told me the name of the first street I needed to turn on.
Elder Judd was as patient and kind as he could be. First, he asked me where I was. Since I had no idea, he asked me to drive to the nearest street sign and tell him what it said. When I did that, he responded that our first goal would be to get me back into the mission. Oops. He stayed on the phone with me for the next 20 minutes or so, guiding me step by step. "Do you see a McDonald's on your right? Good, Sister Winn! You're doing really well! Keep going! Now, is there a grocery store on your left? You are going the right way!" It was a little humiliating, but not too much because people have been doing this for me all my life. I just felt sorry for the poor Elder who was thinking that his mission president's wife was certainly more than a little daft and maybe next time he'd just screen my call rather than be on the phone with me all day! At last, I only had to make two more turns to reach my destination. He told me the name of the first street I needed to turn on. "Okay," I said, "I can see that street. Then what do I do?"
"Oh, just keep going. I will stay on the phone with you" he responded.
"Really," I assured him, "I can probably handle two turns. What should I do next?"
"That's okay, I will just keep talking to you until you get to the building," he insisted. Then he added, "I don't want to overwhelm you."
Overwhelm me? This young man didn't dare tell me two simple steps to follow, for fear that I would get lost again, and have another emotional breakdown! I started laughing, trying to imagine exactly what was going on in his mind as he directed me.
"Why are you laughing?" he asked.
I sighed. "Oh, Elder Judd. I just love you so much!"
His reply confirmed the magnitude of my ineptness:
"And we love you too, Sister Winn. Just the way you are."
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