GPS helped me find my courage

Listen to this article

I told myself I wouldn’t get a GPS.

Having moved to Charlotte last year, I planned to try to learn the city on my own, without the aid of high-tech gadgets.

Plus, I really didn’t want to part with the $200 or whatever a GPS would cost.

I was content with going to MapQuest and printing out directions for whenever I needed to go, even if that meant killing some trees.

I just wanted to go out exploring, to roll the windows down and just drive, letting the roads take me where they wanted and going places no boy from Lafitte, La., had ever gone before.

But that idea tanked pretty fast. I noticed that I really wasn’t getting off the beaten path. Although I thought I had the sense of adventure of Lewis and Clark, I found out that I’m a wuss who’s not comfortable leaving the interstate for some dark and strange tertiary road.

So, after my income tax refund came in last month, my wife — who probably was sick of seeing the same sights over and over — agreed to let me buy a GPS.

And, boy, has it changed my life.

I feel, well, like my quality of life has been given an injection of steroids. This is perhaps the greatest piece of consumer technology ever invented, behind Mr. Coffee.

I’m now driving like a native, thanks to the wisdom of the robotic female voice that tells me to “drive the highlighted route.”

My 4-year-old is happy about the GPS, too. A bit of a hypochondriac, he never liked it when, pre-GPS, I would announce to my passengers that I was lost. His quality of life has improved, too.

To be fair to myself, though, it’s not really easy to just drive around Charlotte if you’re not from here. The names of streets change more often than Californians change their faces via plastic surgery.

I never realized how often streets change their names in Charlotte until I got the GPS. I can’t recall how many times I’ve looked at that little screen and saw a street’s name just up and change. No wonder I would get lost.

Now, I own the roads, with navigational knowledge that rivals the gods.

No more being afraid to veer off the interstate and lunge onto some road I’ve never been on. No more boring my wife and kids with the same tried-and-true routes we’ve always taken.  I’m going to dazzle them with new scenery every weekend.

Thanks to my GPS, my family is no longer limited to my limited knowledge of where things are in Charlotte.

If I want to find the nearest Starbucks, I just type “Starbucks” and the blessed gadget gives me a list of 20. I press “Go,” and we’re off to pay for overpriced caffeine.

While my newfound freedom is great, there’s a downside, of course: All that gas I’m burning is not cheap. Ditto for all that Starbucks.

But can you really put a price on your freedom?

Editor Deon Roberts can be reached at [email protected].