Cape Cod: Exploring a Sense of Place

Building My Cognitive Map

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few years ago before I moved to the Cape,  I came here to visit my friends Marilyn and Paul. I had only visited the Cape a few times before, many years ago. They drove me around, showing me the sites, giving me a tour of their favorite Cape Cod spots. I had only a vague idea of where things were, of directions, or where one place was in relationship to another. On my own, I could find my way from the Mid Cape Highway to my friends’ house and back again, and for that I checked the map often.

 

At the end of my visit before heading home, I needed to find a gas station. Paul gave me directions that included a left turn, a traffic circle (I should go straight through it), and a right turn at the next traffic light. I would see the Hess station ahead of me across from the supermarket. I headed off into the unknown. After what seemed like several miles I came to the traffic circle and continued as instructed. Just past the circle I noted a house with a large wooden, red, white, and blue “Patriot missile” in the front yard. Painted along its narrow length were the words "Go Patriots." It took a minute for the meaning to click. I'm not a football fan, and besides, I lived in Giants country. I continued on, and after what seemed many miles more, I came to the traffic light. I made the right turn and spotted the Hess station and the supermarket across from it. I filled the tank,  then followed the rest of Paul's directions through more uncharted territory to reconnect with the Mid Cape Highway and head back to New York.

 

Fast-forward several years: I have now lived on the Cape for six months. My new home is about a mile from that same Hess station. I regularly make the trip from my house to my friends,’  turning at the same traffic light, passing the home of the Patriots’ fan (I thought of him the day of the Super Bowl), navigating the same traffic circle, continuing on a now- familiar stretch of road, and, in a matter of minutes I reach my friends' home. Sometime during the first weeks of living here, a subtle mental shift occurred. What once was uncharted territory, mere "space" according to Ryden, became familiar, and the journey that once seemed many miles long now takes only minutes. How could I have thought the distance was so far? I make the trip now and to locations beyond almost automatically. 

 

The distances are the same as they always were, of course. It is my familiarity with the area that has changed. What I have done unconsciously is to use what I have learned through experience and habit. I have stored the important information to construct a cognitive map of this part of the Cape. What was once an unknown space on a map is becoming place. 

 

 

 

[1] Yi-Fu Tuan. Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience. (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1977) 136.

 

[2] Kent C. Ryden, Mapping the Invisible Landscape: Folklore, Writing, and the Sense of Place. (Iowa City: Iowa University Press, 1993) 37.