I'm on the East Bank, I'm on the West Bank

After much experience of getting lost, I have firmly convinced myself that getting lost is the best way to truly get to know a place. It forces you to get up close and personal with where ever you are. I've gotten lost while I was at work plenty of times, but I have never gotten on an express way, going the wrong way with no exit except across a two mile long bridge with a class starting in half an hour. OH WAIT. I have.

My schedule is pretty tight, and I have to go from our campus on the east bank to the campus on the west bank in the space of an hour and a half. That doesn't sound like it should be too bad. And it isn't...when I don't get held up with things at the east bank, when I remember to bring my lunch with me, and when traffic is good. Today, none of those things happened. I was running behind, but it was manageable. Little did I know, that missing my exit would turn my whole day around. Literally.

To get to the west bank, I have to cross the Crescent City Connection, which is a huge and scary bridge complete with rush hour traffic. The traffic's mild compared to Chicago, but imagine beingy suspended a hundred or so feet in the air with cars whizzing and getting cut off by a janky turquoise pick-up with his windows tinted out and his muffler rattling the whole g.d. bridge. You're not sure if his tires are going to fall off before the duct-tape holding the topper on to the truck gives out, but you don't have time to worry about that because the Buick Lacrosse in front of you can't decide if she's going 50 mph or 30, and the sedan behind to you wants you to hustle your buns.  Meanwhile the SUV that's next to you wants in your lane, and you better move the hell over soon. And during all of this, you're trying not to think about how one false move could send you plunging into the depths of the Mississippi. Missing an exit is totally understandable under these conditions.

The next logical thing was to take the next exit. I can count on both of my hands the number of times I've been on the west bank, and with the clock was tick-tocking, it seemed logical to just hop back on the interstate and take the correct exit. I passed one exit on my way to the west bank, so there should be one exit before the toll for the bridge.

WRONG. SO SO WRONG.

It was too late. There was traffic and honking and trucks and cars and tolls and toll tags. I stared in disbelief, dumbfounded by the terrible illogical construction of this horrible, scary bridge as I merged into a mire of filthy traffic. My exit was a figment of my imagination. It only exits when you're heading to the west bank. It doesn't exist when you're going the other way. The only thing I could do was cross the bridge BACK to the east bank, turn around, and cross AGAIN to the west bank. 

THIS SHOULD BE FUNNY, I repeated out loud. But it wasn't. There were a lot of things I needed to do before class started, and no telling how long it was going to get turned around and back where I needed to be. So I did the only logical thing a girl could do: call my mother and burst into tears. And she said the only logical thing a mom could say: "I can't help you."

In the end, all was well. 

But here's a map of the days journeys, just for emphasis.