The World Around You

As if it’s not bad enough that a sex offender was hired by the Blountsville Police Department, but the police chief knew he wa a convicted sex offender when he hired him! Who made this idiot chief of police?

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My weekly column was published in the May 4th edition of the Wednesday (Prattville) Progress:

I have been all over rural Alabama in the last few weeks, traveling with my job. One thing that was clearly demonstrated to me is that people give directions differently. It isn’t so much that some people give good directions and some give bad, although that is certainly true, there are just different ways to do it. Some people just give landmarks and no street names. Those directions go something like this, take a right turn at the Wal-Mart, you’ll see the Dairy Queen on your right, turn at the first street past the DQ and turn into the fifth driveway on the left. These directions can be fine, as long as you don’t miss the landmarks and they haven’t changed since the last time the person giving the directions visited the area.

Others give you no landmarks and only streets. Come into town and take a right on Finch Avenue. Follow that to Oakwood Lane, take a right then a left onto Bergman Lane. Even if by chance you can find all of those streets you have no idea how far it is between them so it’s impossible to know if you’ve missed them or just haven’t gotten to them yet.

Then you get the most ominous words anyone can read in a set of directions, turn off the paved road. Because once you turn off the paved road you know you’re venturing into the unknown. Also, once you turn off the paved road you can only rely on landmarks to get you where you need to go, because there likely won’t be any street signs.

After some interesting adventures with directions, I went in search of some tips to offer people when they are giving directions. Here are some tips from Ehow.com that I believe are valuable. First, name permanent landmarks, such as stoplights, bridges and railroad tracks. Second, be redundant, give street names in addition to landmarks. Third, add warnings to your directions. Name places that will be seen if one goes too far, and mention confusing intersections. Also, consider giving distances in miles between streets and landmarks. Provide your phone number with the directions in case the person gets lost, despite your best efforts to guide him. Finally, bad directions are worse than no directions. If you don’t know how to direct someone to the place they’re going, don’t try.

Credibility is extremely important when giving directions, just ask Reverend Billy Graham. One day early in his career, Reverend Graham arrived in a small town to preach a sermon. Hoping to run some errands first, he approached a young boy on the street and asked him where he might mail a letter. After the boy had directed him to the local post office, Graham thanked him and invited him to attend the sermon. “If you’ll come to the Baptist church this evening,” he said, “you can hear me telling everyone how to get to heaven.” “I don’t think I’ll be there,” the youngster replied. “You don’t even know your way to the post office!”

Maybe all of our direction-giving skills could use a little improvement. There’s nothing quite like the appreciation that comes from someone who was able to get where they needed to go because of good directions.

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