Speaking of black holes...
I’ve been traveling to Jersey City on business lately. Navigating through Jersey City by car is not a process that can be rationally explained by either 1) phone directions, 2) Mapquest or 3) any commercial map of Hudson County, NJ.
Mapquest gives such crystal clear instructions as Step 10: Turn LEFT onto US-1 & 9 TRUCK/US-1 TRUCK/US-9 TRUCK, followed by Step 11: Turn RIGHT onto US-1 & 9 TRUCK/US-1 TRUCK/US-9 TRUCK. I am not making this up.
The first time I drove there was a brilliantly sunny afternoon, and knowing that I was heading for Exchange Place, which is dominated by glass-skinned skyscrapers, I just headed for tall shiny buildings and hoped for the best. I made a couple of wrong turns, and there were some one-way streets, but a nice security guard at a construction site said, “It’s that green building over there,” and I found it. I had the Hudson County map stretched out on the seat next to me, but it would take me a full cycle at a traffic light just to find where I was, so it didn’t do me any good.
Today, though, the sky was filled with thick gray clouds and icy rain was falling. Having not had too much success crafting my own route the first time, I decided I would instead follow the verbal directions I’d originally been given over the phone. But they were equally vague, leaning towards “I don’t remember the name of that street” and “Don’t take that exit but the next one.” I got off too early and thought I could use the tall-building strategy again, but it was almost impossible to see any tall buildings through the squall-like conditions. As someone remarked, it was a little like Hansel and Gretel leaving breadcrumbs. Didn’t work as well the second time.
You must understand that there are two basic routes from where I live to Jersey City. One is the Belleville Turnpike, which is a two-lane highway that cuts through swamp lands past a decrepid Jewish cemetery, a radio station and, strangely, if I recall correctly, a Poland Spring warehouse. I think you might pass Pizzaland from the Sopranos too. If Jimmy Hoffa isn't buried here, then Big Pussy is. It's definitely sleeping-with-the-fishes territory. And though the bullrushes are nice, you eventually have to deal with the 1 & 9 thing.
The other choice is to take the Garden State Parkway through Irvington, go through a dispiriting ghetto in order to head east on Interstate 78 (because there’s no 78-E exit from the Garden State Parkway heading south), then take the Turnpike Extension. This puts you right through the ugliest and bleakest highway landscape known to man.
Luckily, there is a compass built into my minivan and occasionally I could see little patches of skyscraper through the gray sky. They weren't much more than faint ghosts, fleeting mirages in a soggy desert. But with vigorous concentration, and that compass, I eventually reached them.
Until this exercise, I never understood what the Turnpike Extension was. It was one of those terms, like "cantilevered," that simply failed to rouse any image in my brain. I still don't understand what 1 & 9 is, and why there's a truck route 1 & 9 and non-truck route 1 & 9, and why it has two numbers in the first place. As far as I can tell, all this information is disclosed on a strictly need-to-know basis. Somehow I got there, and lived to tell the tale. That's more than I can say for Jimmy Hoffa.
