Found my old paper road atlas from 2003 and it still had my old route to my grandma's house marked in highlighter

I was cleaning out a closet and pulled out this big, folded map book I used to keep in my car. The page for my home state was worn thin at the folds, and there was a bright yellow line drawn from my college town to her place in Springfield. It hit me that I haven't touched a paper map in over 15 years, and I felt a weird mix of happy and sad looking at it. Do you still keep any old paper maps around, or is that skill totally gone now?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_joseph2mo ago

My uncle still has a 1998 AAA map of Florida in his glove box. He says the creases are like a history of every wrong turn he ever took. I get that happy-sad feeling too. GPS killed a certain kind of adventure, the kind where you had to figure it out yourself. I bet that highlighter line brings back a whole lot more than just directions.

logan_clark442mo ago

Still find plenty of wrong turns with GPS, honestly.

calebm751mo ago

A 1998 map? That thing is older than my car. How does it even fold anymore without turning to dust?