I recently had the same dream twice. In the dream, I’m on a moving train and somehow, I know that we are heading through mountainous terrain and headed for a bridge over a very wide chasm. I suddenly worry that the map being used is out of date and we may be heading to a sheer drop – in fact it seems likely since somehow, I know that the map is out of date and does not reflect current reality.
I’ve always been fascinated with maps and the idea of mapping the surroundings. It just seemed like a great way to understand your surroundings, especially the ones that you have not yet visited. My father spent most of his working career as a cartographer – a mapmaker. His first mapmaking job was with the Army Map Service in Washington, D.C. This is where he learned the mapmaking basics that he carried with him when he took a job with the Maryland State Highway Service as a cartographer. This was well before computers took over that craft as it has today – so for my dad it was a manual process – working with aerial photographs, enlarged to a much bigger and detailed print size that would then be placed on a special light table - then mylar sheets that had an orange coating would be placed over the photos – and “scribing” tools would be used to basically be used to scrape the orange coating to let the light shine through and show where the various highway types would be displayed – local roads, state highways, federal interstates, etc. Each of these highway types would be a separate mylar sheet that would then be used in the color printing press process, and magically a printed highway map, complete with the current governor’s picture, would be made - and these would be available for free to drivers navigating the roads of the state.
It was certainly a major leap of technology when you could call your local AAA office and order a “TripTik” for an upcoming trip. This was essentially a free booklet, each page showing the roads to be taken on your journey, that would guide you to your destination.
It was a different time – and it seems so antiquated now that we are so used to GPS to get everywhere – which I will say that I am addicted to as a very helpful tool.
But it begs the question “What is real, what is fake, and how can you know the difference?” – what can you count on – is the mapmaker real, truthful, honest and accurate? These questions did not seem relevant at the time when my dad was manually making maps – there was only one way to get a state highway map and of course it was accurate – I knew that, especially since my dad was part of the process.
But of course, historically maps made by early explorers were not always accurate - the information available was limited to what could be seen or what they learned from others – so the edges of a flat world, complete with sea monsters and all manner of danger, was a way to complete what was not a complete picture in reality – it was simply a way to fill in what wasn’t known.
But now, maps exist in all manner of digital form – and can be changed to reflect those desires and objectives of the mapmaker – fake news really – sharpies easily used to modify and manipulate – to show whatever the mapmaker wants to show – a far cry from using aerial photos and manual tools to depict reality. Looking back, the manual process seems so quaint.
Some say that you can intentionally dream the same dream again but change certain things so they will turn out differently. I hope that’s true because the next time that I re-dream that same dream, or if it simply comes up on its own, I’ll make sure my Dad is up front driving the train.
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