Some people have a fear of snakes. Some people have a fear of heights. Some people have a fear of dogs. At least those make sense, because technically those items and situations can be dangerous. So it may surprise you to hear of one of my main fears: accidentally driving into New York City.

You may ask, how does one accidentally drive anywhere, let alone a specific place like NYC? Well, when there are corridors like bridges and tunnels plus poor signage, anything can happen. I know I don’t need psychological help for this because I know exactly when this fear began. For my first job out of college years ago, I had to travel within Florida to a place that was across a very long bridge from the airport and car rental return place. This was in the days of printed AAA maps and Atlases only.

Anyways, as you can imagine, from my minimal map setup (and the premise of this article), I accidentally got on the bridge instead of getting off before it added 45 minutes to my commute to get to the airport. Fortunately I think I still made my flight, because I don’t remember much after that. Or perhaps it was so traumatic I’ve blocked it out. At any rate, the experience was clearly very stressful.

In fact, in those days, driving in most new towns was stressful. Nowadays people forget what it is like to be told: Turn left at the billboard for RadioShack and watch your odometer to count 7 miles until the street you need comes up. (And never really knowing if you already passed it.) I did at least then have some success in convincing my employer to buy first-of-their-kind CDs that had U.S. maps we could zoom in on and print out.

But still, we live on the East Coast—how can one accidentally drive to NYC? Well, where I happen to live, we are often driving east on 78 or north on 95 or northeast on 80 by Teaneck. Do you know how many signs there are about tunnels and bridges on those highways? If you are not from the area, I will explain: too many. There are duplicate signs on the local and express lanes of tunnels/bridges coming up, and rarely ones right at the juncture when you have to make the pivotal decision. I dislike planning most of my drive to be only “towards the George Washington Bridge” when I have no desire to cross that bridge that day. Plus, I don’t do the drive often enough to know when that “Last Exit Before Toll” sign comes up.

There are some positives to my abnormal fear. For example, now I keep fake mental tally marks to proudly record and report back to my kids how many times I did not accidentally end up in NYC. On one recent trip to the American Dream Mall I successfully avoided at least three major sign directions to end up in the Lincoln or even Holland Tunnel.

Oddly enough, I am comfortable driving within New York City, and don’t mind the occasional schlep to help with Wilf or Stern college move-ins, as long as there’s no traffic.

I will say my spouse had a similar fear of signage when we visited where I grew up in California. (What do you mean I have a quarter-mile to get across eight lanes of traffic for a left exit? Couldn’t they have notified us more clearly and earlier?). But clearly it is easier to avoid accidentally driving to California when one lives in New Jersey.

Fortunately, insurance rates only go up for driving accidents — and not for accidental driving results.

Debbie Marcus lives in Basking Ridge, New Jersey and is a former Jewish Link Superfan.