Maps really aren’t that helpful. There’s just a bunch of geometric shapes, numbers, and names that randomly highlight sites with dots like stars in the sky. My editor had given me a task, and I needed to find my way to the site of Enrico Fermi's lab, where the first nuclear chain reactions were successfully achieved. Science has always held my fascination, and the lab’s achievement was a milestone for science and for history. The only maps I could locate, however, included an online Chicago Transit Authority system map and the one in the phone book. But these maps, as well as my sense of direction, were lacking, so I decided that if I wanted to get to the site of the first nuclear chain reaction I had to take it to the streets.

There are one million and one ways to travel from point A to point B. Every person in this city relates to their physical location differently from the next. My hope is to get as many maps of this city as I possibly can, and so I armed myself with a variety of pens and paper so people could locate their moods with their writing (mapping!) utensil. I was entirely reliant on everybody to get me to my destination. Would I get there?

Chicago often boasts of the grid system that manages its streets. The zero mark is at the intersection of State and Madison, and the site I wanted to go to today was 56 blocks south and an undetermined distance east from there. I needed a map, bringing me face-to-face with my original problem.

“Excuse me, do you know how to get to 56th and Ellis?” I inquired of the boy who joined me at the bus stop. Since we were standing at the same stop, I made the assumption that he was traveling to the same destination that I was and, therefore, knowledgeable about the area and the events occurring at the University of Chicago 50 years ago. Naturally.

“I don’t really know where that is, I’m not from around here,” was his simple response. I was not to be deterred by this evasion. He couldn’t get off that easily and I implored further into the tenuous associations of his mind. I badgered him to get my coveted directions. Instead, he went on a tangent on how to get to the Newberry library. “Yeah, I’d take the Red Line up there, and it’s only a few blocks from the station. South of Division, and it’s next to a park, umm, besides that, it might also be just north of State. You can’t really miss it,” he said.

Thanks a lot, I thought.

The bus arrived, dumping fumes that plumed onto the street. My friend with the backpack and I sat in opposite seats, signaling the end of our conversation. I was map-less. The boy wasn’t interested in devoting any more time to my quest, and it was evident that my time was up with him.

Six minutes passed till I arrived at my stop, when I shamefully displayed my ignorance of Chicago city buses, trying to get off by pushing on the doors too soon, which set off the alarm. I looked back towards the boy. I received an affirmative nod that I was on the right path. Or maybe it was a good-luck-I-don’t-really-know-where-I’m-sending-you kind of look. No turning back now.

Before my trip, I had only been down in Hyde Park once as a child when I went to the Museum of Science and Industry. Places as exotic as the museum can seem as far away as Sumatra when you’re little. I had no idea how I arrived there and you know, it really didn’t matter. My favorite part of the museum was the giant heart that you could walk through and see all the parts inside moving, pumping. The inner walls were a translucent, glowing membrane and I felt my arm could puncture the artery with one accidental gesture. It’s fascinating to me how this “mapping” of the heart made sense to me, and unbelievable now, knowing how blood and organs work together to coerce my nausea.

I interrupted more and more people traveling on foot in search for a comprehensible map. In choosing to forgo the safety of their cars, these pedestrians were just begging to be asked for directions. People that leave their arms unfolded from their chests or have an invitation within their smile, pace or stride: I can pin-point you a mile away. I can smell you coming with your profuse knowledge of urban planning. I will hunt you down.