An unknown street

My dream.

It is late afternoon; I am riding my bike through a neighborhood that is familiar in that the houses are of a type that I have known, the yards differ from one another but are also of a type I have known, kids are running down the sidewalks, yelling and chasing one another in some game or another, as kids always have done.

I come to a street corner, stop my bicycle to look at the street sign so that I can find my location on the map I take out of my pocket. This sign makes no sense, Seventy Fifth St.,andFirst Street;that makes no sense at all, I don’t know how to find that intersection on my map nor in my memory. I look up at the signs again, there must be something I am missing here, but the signs are just as I had read them; looking around the neighborhood again I hope for something, anything that will show me where I am so that I can go where I want to be.

I am used to a street map that is laid out in Cartesian co-ordinates, blocks that of the same size, streets that are rational, every now and again a major artery that runs for miles and can be my guide home; the map I hold in my hand shows twists and turns, loops and dead-ends all with no sense to them; none of the names are familiar, they seem to always be the names of the daughters of the original developers, names that relate to nothing beyond themselves. My map is useless, my present location isn’t on it, nor is my home neighborhood or address.

The afternoon sun is approaching the horizon, I need to keep track of the time because I have no light on my bike; I don’t want to be out on the roads at night where I can’t see or be seen, where I might be struck without warning.

An attractive woman approaches me; an open smile, a pleasant face, she says that I look as if I could use some help; I ask her to point out on the map where I am now, I ask her about major streets that have been the defining routes around here for over a hundred years; she continues to smile, tells me that she is sure I will find my way, but nothing on the map is familiar to her, as she walks away she repeats that she is sure I will find my way.

Where will I be when the sun goes down? Where am I now? Why didn’t that woman know anywhere beyond her own neighborhood? Why do I think that someone else will know my direction when I don’t?

I would be frightened to be lost if I was hungry, but I am not; if the weather was cold and rainy, but it is pleasantly warm. It is just that I am at an unknown street corner where I can’t even tell which way is north, I don’t know where I will be when night falls.