RELIEF - Maphead - page 168

wasthrilledtofindthatSeattle'snearestconfluencewaslessthanahalfhourfrommyfront
door—butmyattempttovisit48degreesnorth,122degreeseastcameupshort.Therewere
noarmyantsorborderguards,buttherewerenofewerthanfour NOTRESPASSING signspos-
ted just a few tantalizing yards from my quarry. I found a few visits to the spot recorded on
the confluence project's website, but most of the hunters had just bushwhacked halfway to
the spot from a back road, and none had logged the spot in accordance with strict Degree
Confluence Project guidelines—that is, with the permission of the landowner.
Which is why I tracked down Rodger. He seems unflustered by his newfound claim
to fame. “I knew the property was on the forty-eight-north line, but I had no idea about
the—confluence, you called it?” But when I ask if I can visit the all-important square foot
of land, I find out that it won't be possible for months. Rodger is a cook on a tugboat cur-
rently bound for Hawaii and then Wake Island—one of the Travelers' Century Club's most
troublesome destinations, if you'll recall. “I'll call you when I get back,” he promises.
I expect never to hear from him again, but two months later, Rodger's as good as his
word. “When do you want to come up and see 48/122?” he asks. That very weekend, he
and I are out trampling the ferns at the end of his driveway, swinging our respective GPS
receivers around like blind men with white canes. Just like geocaching, only without any-
thing tangible waiting to be found.
“Near as I can tell, it's right here,” says Rodger finally. “Zero zero zero. All zeroes.”
I wonder if I will feel some lightning crackle of Global Significance when I stand on the
magic point, but nothing happens. I dutifully take a picture of the fateful ferns. Just as with
the roadgeeks, attention must be paid.
“Do you feel like it's an honor to be the caretaker of 48° N 122° W?” I ask Rodger.
He shrugs. “I dunno. It's a two-edged sword. I might have to put up a sign at the end of
the driveway now, so people can leave their phone numbers if they want to visit the spot.”
“What about a plaque?” I joke.
“Yeah, I thought about that . . .” he says quite seriously, stroking his chin.
On the winding forest roads back to the freeway, the stentorian British tones of my GPS
device inform me that I've missed my turn-off. “You turned the wrong way, dumb-ass,”
scoldsDaniel.“JustdowhatIsay.”Imusthavebeendistractedbythethoughtofthousands
of confluence hunters combing the Earth for perfectly arbitrary geometric points. At least
members of the Highpointers Club are climbing to real geographical peaks, albeit minor
onesinmanycases.Theearth'sgridoflatitudeandlongitude,ontheotherhand,is entirely
arbitrary. The fact that we divide the circle into 360 degrees is an ancient artifact based on
theBabylonians'(incorrect)estimateofthenumberofdaysinayear.Linesoflongitudeare
even more arbitrary, since the Earth doesn't have any West Pole or East Pole. Our current
zero-degree line of longitude, the Prime Meridian through Greenwich, was a convention
chosen only after much political wrangling at the 1884 International Meridian Conference,
called by mutton-chopped U.S. president Chester A. Arthur. France refused to vote for the