In case you get lost- Triple A has free Maps

Long before the invention of the Global Positioning System, or GPS, there were these things called paper maps! The American Automotive Association or AAA had paper maps and you could get them for free if you were a member. My mother loved this service and I think, looking back, had a map addiction problem. On her way home from the store she would pull in and say, “Suzie, go in there and get us a map of California.”  I protested, “mom, we already have twenty-seven of them!”  But she insisted, and since I was a kid I acquiesced, lest I get smacked.  

It was on a warm summer morning that her map addiction came in handy. She had loaded up the car with her six children and headed to Yosemite National Park. Taking a wrong turn, she got lost deep in the labyrinth of roads. The sun was setting, there were no hotels and so she decided to park the Station Wagon and tell us to go to sleep till morning. About the time we began complaining we had no blankets, she reached into the glove compartment and pulled out a stack of maps, handed us each one and said, “Here, take this, it will trap the heat and keep you warm, now go to sleep!” All night long, every time someone rolled over, the map would crinkle, the laughing started, everyone woke up, then it would settle down, until someone rolled over, crinkle went the map and then it started all over again.

Many people are fascinated by maps because more than their ability to give us directions, they can give us perspective. C.S Lewis writes in Mere Christianity: 

“…if you want to go anywhere, a map is absolutely necessary. As long as you are content with walks on the beach, your own glimpses are far more fun than looking at a map, but the map is going to be more use than walks on the beach if you want to leave the beach and sail to America.”

Beginning a new year by putting together a map for your life is such a comfort.  Like maps that are made by people who have gone before us, adding information from others who have gone before us helps us to mitigate unnecessary disasters.  It’s not to say that obstacles are bad, certainly, like tempered steel thrust into the fire, it is that stress that makes one strong. Or to put it another way, “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”  But the idea of a map is, if it is followed, aids us in navigating a path as simply and directly towards our desired destination. And if you get lost, it can always double as a blanket.