A terrible combination

God gifted me with optimism, and then combined it with a terrible sense of direction. The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.

Today I walked to Wal-Mart to do my shopping, all part of my general plan to walk places when they are within walking distance, and it was a tiresome walk, let me tell you. The recent hurricane has caused a great deal of debris to build up on the sides of the roads, and every time I would reach a massive pile of debris in my path, obscuring the sidewalk or stretch of lawn I was walking on, I would have to stop and wait for the oncoming traffic to let up enough that I could go around (on the street). And it was rush hour. So tricky.

Well, on the way back, laden with heavy groceries, I thought I'd be all crafty and take one of the side streets, and it would go around through a nice neighborhood and eventually lead back to the main road, and then I'd have avoided all the debris areas until I got back to the portion of the road that had sidewalks. I didn't know the neighborhood at all, but I thought, Well, hey, all roads lead to Rome, right?

And I walked, and I walked - it was a nice neighborhood - and I walked and I walked, and a busload of interested young children went past me and pointed at me (I waved at them cheerfully because I was cleverly avoiding debris and getting groceries and saving the environment). After a while, I had still found no road leading back to the main road, and I was beginning to suspect there never would be one. So I turned around and started heading back, all the long way back to where I had originally come into the neighborhood. It was very, very long. The bus full of children passed me up again. They were still all pointing and interested but I was like MOVE ALONG YA LITTLE FUCKERS, THERE IS NOTHING TO SEE HERE.

Of course when I got back to the main road and looked back in dismay at the neighborhood that had totally failed to help me, that was when I noticed the NO OUTLET sign. Damn neighborhood. No outlet indeed. I was about ready to get a bulldozer and MAKE a damn outlet. Shit.