A little thing I wrote the night before I left Denver when something bad happened to me. Paul sings it on his myspace page - PaulGettyBand. I don't have it set to the framework because it was so spontaneous, but I'll revise and lengthen it later via that process.

10:48 PM me: bad night... I dropped my hard drive off the table - it's wasted
Paul: shit! that sucks
10:49 PM no mother ever dreams that her daughter's gonna grow up to be a junky
my job wants to take the crackhead prostitute back
10:50 PM me: i blew off ian cause i was pissed and sulking
10:51 PM Paul: ha what were you supposed to do
me: meet him somewhere
i refused to come out of the basement to take his phone call
10:53 PM Paul: sorry you feel so shitty dude
going somewhere will be good for you
me: it happens
10:54 PM you can't drop those things, period
10:55 PM Paul: ya

is anything ever lost?
i don't know
but I know
whenever we keep to ourselves
there's a cost

people used to say
watch your things
because to share was to risk
so put on your rings
and close your fists

you just couldn't trust folks
not even a neighbor
some said word was bond
but most held their guard (god)
otherwise...
some jealous mothafucker
was sure to treat you like a sucker

now everything is different
not that people are indifferent
but the game has changed
some say digital is to blame
whatever the case
things certainly ain't the same

we're closer to the ideal
sharing for security is for real
so you can keep your stack up
but when the original fails
you better have a backup

fire, flood, death by impact
nothing, not even your identity
will survive forever intact
distribute your self
distribute your stuff
lest one copy not be enough

is anything ever lost?
i don't know
but I know
whenever we keep to ourselves
there's a cost

I don't remember when I first fell in love with maps. Maybe it was because my parents had done some round-the-world trips and were eager for me to learn the names of the places they had been. Maybe it was because I used to have a huge “stereographic” (no borders, just topography and terrain) world map framed on the wall in my room. Maybe it was because I had nice globe with topographic features from an early age. Perhaps it was because my father showed me how he had placed pins in his, one color for places he had been and another people he had met from exotic locales. Since I traveled a lot in Europe when I was young, I did the same to my globe, except I placed different color pins in the countries from which I believed my ancestors had lived... most nations ended up pierced.

I thought it necessary for me to write this essay for many reasons, but unlike most of my topics, the primary motivation is not intellectual or analytical. It comes from the visceral feeling of enchantment I have always had when looking at maps. I can't think of anything else in the world equally capable of holding my attention. However, the strength of the allure varies with my mood and circumstances. Perhaps I have never spent more time looking at maps than in the last couple of years, when I have thought more of travel. To find me staring at a map is usually a good indicator that I have become either restless or aimless, likely both. When I feel this way, and it usually coincides with my minor bouts of depression, I often find solace in staring at the shapes, colors, lines, and text that define the Earth's patiality in such a unique way. What brought me to write this is question of why.

What do maps do for me... for us? Many things of course. They define our world in a highly comprehensible way. They remind us of how big the world still is. They give us a framework in which there are almost limitless ways to divide, categorize, and understand it. They show me the places I have been and those which I want to go. They allow us to locate places and people we hear about spatially. They allow me to gain knowledge that helps feign familiarity with an immense number of places. More importantly though, they allow me to dream. I just fall right into them, tracing the dots, letters, and lines of cites, countries, and roads. I mentally transport myself to that place, testing my knowledge of it and wondering how I can come to know it more intimately. I know that lots of other people also engage in this kind of activity, but I am often appalled by the amount who never do.

I remember my shock at an American I know very well not being able to locate South Carolina (my birth state) on a map of the US. This really bothered me. It isn't only that we are taught such things in school or my belief that highly educated people should have a grasp on such rudimentary geography, but that it showed a a lack of concern (a disrespect) for knowledge. Maps just seem to me to be such an important part of our culture. Still, I guess it isn't really that shocking. Up until quite recent times, the vast majority of people never needed to consult them. They knew the small area in which they spent their lives very well and simply asked for direction when navigating other places they occasionally visited. As the speed of transportation increased with the advent of the car and airplane, maps became far more essential.

Let me clarify that I'm not talking about high end navigational maps sailors and aviators must learn to interpret. I don't even mean backcountry topographical maps. They are all very interesting and useful, but I consider them to be outside the scope of this essay because their use is firmly outside the scope of general experience. What about roadmaps? Well, this difference is key to what makes maps special to me. Why? Because roads are social... people built them to bring different areas of their lives closer together. One of my favorite possessions is a thick American Road Atlas. It doesn't get too specific with city streets and gives a good overview of all the geographic and social features connected by roads in my country... everything is of course. I'll study that thing whenever I'm in the car and don't have anything better to do. I often wonder what kind of recall I'll have of the information if I have to one day apply it... or how much of it will never be applied.

However, maps are one of those lovely instances where my internal pragmatic tyrant can't run roughshod over my momentary enchantment. This can easily break my concentration when dealing with textual or video media, but it is mostly powerless over the map. It embodies the virtues of use and depth, but adds a unique element of pure enjoyment. I don't know if I could ever tire of looking around the flat, multicolored world maps on everyone's wall, but luckily, I won't have to find out. One of the reasons I love Google so much is their mapping applications. I remember using Google Earth to fly around the site of the 2004 tsunami and trying to interpret the issue through a discussion of natural disasters, the global arms trade, post colonial history, and ethics in sociology... and then stopping. I remember looking wistfully up towards the images being projected telling my students that despite how Junior Scholastic had promised me flying cars and my father's attempts to instill in me a reverence for computers, this was the very first thing in the twenty first century that had ever truly impressed me.

The interactive possibilities of maps online are now expanding rapidly. Spatiality is the next frontier in web applications. Soon all of our phones will be GPS enabled and we will have to make hard choices about how often we want to let others know where we are and how often we want to look to our screens for guidance in our travels. Along with many others, I think this ultra-pragmatic, information-intense spatiality will be a very double edged sword... at least at first. Sure, I love YELP as much as the next guy, but I'm already using google maps while driving even though the software offers this mandatory message every time you start it: “Do not use this program while driving.” I click OK and do it anyway, though very much aware of the danger involved. Still, I have a special affection for that old multicolored paper paper map on the wall. Even if the digital versions allow me to zoom, fly, change directions, and paint on top of them, I'll keep gazing at it and loving it all the same.