I got skills that cannot be matched. I get lost in my hometown, in the woods, in the supermarket, I generally get lost in life itself. I once received a book with all my blogs bundled with the title: “I’m not lost, just undiscovered”.
Back to my skills. Sometimes I have to step out of the safety of my comfort zone to go to a networking event in downtown Portland. So courageously, I drove that evening to downtown Portland, leaving a trail of breadcrumbs to find my way back. Photos of the parking garage, photos of the street, and even a photo of which floor I left my car on. This can’t go wrong, you might think…
My superpower skills never fail, I got lost… Not once, but twice! After parking my car in a garage, I followed the blue dots on Google Maps. I was confident, I only had to follow the blue dots. A child can do this. It was only a six-minute walk from the garage to the bar. When I still hadn’t found it after 15 minutes and kept walking in circles, I was apparently spotted by a man in his Food Truck. “Where do you need to be?” he asked in his broken English. He had seen me passing by for the third time, so I heard. I showed him the place on my Google Maps. “Take that street and then the first to the right.”
That simple? I thought to myself. “And if you can’t find it, come back to me!” Fortunately, that was not necessary because it was really that simple. After 25 minutes and with some help, I finally found the bar. Without help, I would probably still be wandering the streets of Portland.
The networking evening was great. I met many new people who told me about life in Portland, while I taught them how to pronounce Gouda Cheese. A whole new world opened up for us.
When it was time to go, I took my Google Maps out of my pocket again, typed in the address of the parking garage and started to follow the blue dots again. Six minutes Google said. I must be able to find my car this time.
It was already getting dark and the streets were filling up with the many bums looking for an alley to sleep. Because I had walked from my car to the bar in so many circles, I now circled back again, until it made me dizzy and had no idea where I was. I was lost yet again!
I felt a slight panic bubble up. Dramatic as I am, I had already decided that I will be wandering the street of Portland for eternity looking for my car. When I finally got stuck in a dark alley and some creepy guy started following me, I decided to call in some help. “Help, I’m lost. I can’t find my car anymore and I don’t know where I am.” I texted my partner who was at work. I texted him my live location and the address of the garage. There are advantages to dating a veteran because he could tell me in seconds exactly, with the information I gave him, where I was and how to get back to my car. I only had to follow instructions while he was following me on the live location tracker. “Now turn right here…”
I turned left…
“RIGHT! girl, not left!” he texted back…Left, right, it’s all jibber-jabber to me. In the end, a 6-minute walk ended in a 50-minute walk to get back to my car.
I know, I have skills that cannot be matched…
