Trust Me, I`ve Been There

Zoe Williams questions her sense of direction. ILLUSTRATION: TOM PERCIVAL / ADVOCATE ART

I ALWAYS ASSUME I HAVE A PRETTY GOOD grasp of the geography of the UK, because I live here. Ever since I knew how to read a map, the UK was the first country I looked at.

I can see that Wales looks like a pig and that Cornwall could, at a pinch, be the misshapen, oversized trotter of said pig. But where Cheshire is in relation to Lancashire, which motorway gets you from A to B, whether Birmingham has its own county or Wiltshire a stretch of coast – I had assumed all this information would just seep in, over the frankly phenomenal amount of time that I have now lived in these parts. It hasn’t, and I can still barely find my way around Soho.

The above notwithstanding, I also – even more obscurely – believe that I know my way around France. I’ve been to Ile de Ré, ergo I think I know where La Rochelle is from, say, Paris. But in actual fact, I’ve no idea. I know Bordeaux is meant to be in the south (is it, though? Am I sounding more stupid than I even intend?), but I have no idea where in France counts as straight south and where south-west or even “The Middle Bit” is? I do, at least, know that Dijon is where you stop when you’re trying to drive all the way through it. Unless you’re driving with children, in which case you stop every hour to curse your holiday planner (husband), children-bi-parenter (husband), driver (husband), until you have no more curses left and you have to just kick him really hard. Dijon is also where you get mustard.

And I know that in Ireland, the bottom bit is where it’s pretty, and the top bit is where all the children are really difficult to understand (something about the accent, combined with a high-pitched voice). But I got all that “intel” straight off the TV. I couldn’t tell you about the individual counties as much as I couldn’t name half of the 50 American states (or is it 49 or 51?).

There must be a tipping point in the human psyche where you suddenly figure you know enough about the planet’s basic layout that you don’t need to concentrate any more. But by the time you realise that you hadn’t actually laid down any information at all, your mind is too grown up to absorb anything new, so you have to make do with your hotchpotch of lies, evasion and Smiths lyrics.

I’m going to add this to my long-term, self-improvement to-do list. One: take an MA in something. Two: join a cycling club. Or inline skating? Or ice-hockey? Something fun and weird. And now, three: work out where everything is, and try to remember it.