Well, hello there. It's Morgan Harper-Nichols here. I'm an artist and a writer, and this is a space

where I turn the lens on various topics and subjects in hopes to learn something new or see something in a new way.

Today's piece is called There Is Another Way. Thank you so much for listening.

I happen to live in a city where a lot of the roads are laid out on a grid,

and it makes it pretty easy to travel from one place to the next.

And I am relatively new to this area. I don't always know my way around. I do get lost.

However, when I make a wrong turn or I miss my turn, I know because of the grid that there's

always another way. There's always another way down another street so I can get back on track to where I need to go.

However, this was not so easy when I lived in a city that was not laid out on a grid.

In the towns where I grew up, everything was a winding road that led to another winding road and missing your turn or taking the wrong turn could take you 20 30 minutes off course.

I actually remember once in college where I went to school not too far from where I grew up in another town where the roads were really

windy that led to another town where the roads were really windy a few friends of mine actually took a wrong turn and ended up in another state

so without the grid it's a little bit harder to recognize wait.

We can stop, we can turn around, and we can find another way.

Sometimes stopping and turning around isn't always possible if there's no place for you to do

so.

So when things aren't laid out on a grid, we lose that sense of ease that there is another way.

And I believe that this is also true of life.

Some things in life are laid out on a grid.

One example of this is schooling.

We know that whether you live in the U.S. or another

country, you have a system where, okay, you start in the U.S. it's kindergarten and then you go from

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