When I was a boy I always contrived to sit near the globe in every classroom of my parochial school. That way, if the lesson was boring (which most of them seemed to be), I at least had something to focus my imagination on. Of all the many fascinating aspects of the standard schoolroom globe, two of my favorites were the cartouche and the analemma. The cartouche is the label – often shaped like a shield or a parchment scroll – in which the manufacturer (Replogle, Cram, Rand-McNalley, etc.) placed its name, its copyright information, and the legend that explains any symbols used on the globe (international boundaries, railroads, canals, ocean depths, etc.). The analemma is a device, shaped like a figure eight, that indicates the position of the sun on each day of the calendar year. On most globes the cartouche and analemma are situated in the Pacific Ocean. The Pacific is the largest body of water on the planet and, despite the thousands of islands that dot it, has more empty (i.e. text-free) space than any other part of the globe. This makes it a convenient spot to dump all sorts of visual aids.

Due to its instructive purpose, the analemma must be situated in the so-called “tropic zone” between the circle of latitude that marks the northernmost place where sunlight falls on the earth from directly overhead (the Tropic of Cancer), and the southernmost place were sunlight falls from directly overhead (the Tropic of Capricorn). This is a vast expanse of the globe and thus the analemma is usually located in the relatively empty part of the tropic zone which straddles longitude line 120 west, an area that lies almost due south of Sacramento.

The cartouche, on the other hand, is not linked to any terrestrial phenomenon and can therefore be located anywhere on a globe and can be as large or as small as the manufacturer cares to make it. I’ve seen cartouches adrift in that part of the Indian Ocean that lies just west of Australia, and I’ve seen others that lie just south of Africa.

Over the years I developed an elaborate fantasy in my head in which Cartouche and Analemma were actually mythological landmasses whose respective peoples hated each other. In this fantasy, the land of Cartouche, because it was mobile and changed positions from globe to globe, was a manmade landmass, an enormous wooden float that rested upon thousands of motorized barges. Its population was descended from pirates who, centuries earlier, had grown tired of plying the seas in dangerous boats and had thus banded together and linked their ships into a giant flotilla via a series of lengthy intertwined ropes (I know this is preposterous but, hey, it was a fantasy). Over the course of many years this webbed flotilla had evolved into the giant wooden continent of Cartouche, which was capable of moving freely across the oceans of the world. Because of its buccaneering heritage, Cartouche was a land of warlords and warriors and gladiators.

Analemma on the other hand, was a fixed continent, shaped like the number eight, whose interior was dominated by two teardrop-shaped bodies of water. Because of the country’s fixed position and warm climate, the Analemmans were a more lawful and peaceful people than their enemies the Cartouchians. It was a land of artists, philosophers, poets, and scientists.

I whiled away many a school day imagining what life was like for ordinary Analemmans and Cartouchians. I mapped out the wars that were fought between these two diverse countries. In my head I created complex histories and cultures for my mythological worlds. In my spiral notebook I wrote lovely lyric poems about life on Analemma, and darker, more violent works about life on Cartouche. Sadly, all this fantasizing proved disastrous to my academic career. While my classmates were learning about Marie Curie or the Stamp Act or gerunds or microbes or how the Battle of the Bulge was fought, I was imagining myself a sentry patrolling the coast of Analemma and keeping a wary eye out for Cartouchian warships. Naturally, I did poorly in grade school, barely made it out of high school, and never went to college. Had I paid more attention to the nuns who were trying to fill my head with knowledge and less attention to the globes that filled my head with fantasy, I might have emerged from grade school a promising scholar with a bright future ahead of him. Instead I emerged from school a lazy daydreamer destined to spend his adult years trying (and mostly failing) to make a living as a creative writer. All my failings in life can be blamed on the Cram, Replogle, and Rand-McNalley corporations. At least, I like to think so.

Many years later, now a grown man with grown stepchildren, I found myself assisting my eldest stepdaughter as she shopped for school supplies for her own children. At one point, Andrea and I wandered into in an aisle where two different types of desk globe were arrayed for sale. One was cheap and generic-looking, with nothing much of interest upon its surface. The other was more expensive, had tons of information printed upon the vast blue of its Pacific Ocean, a handsome cartouche, an analemma, and even a decorative compass rose situated next to the Mascarene Islands. Andrea turned to me and asked, “Do you think I should buy a globe for the kids, to help them with their geography homework?” I picked up the more expensive of the two globes and inspected it. I hadn’t thought much about Cartouche and Analemma since my school days, but suddenly vivid memories of those two mythological continents began to flood my brain. And as I revisited this childhood landscape, I asked myself, “Do you really want your grandchildren following in your footsteps? Do you want to take the blame if little Christina finds herself lured by the analemma into a life of fantasy, poetry, and joblessness?” A man on the horns of a serious dilemma, I found myself thinking of all the language lessons and musical instruction I might have financed for Andrea when she was a schoolgirl, the skiing vacations and equestrienne sessions I might have given her had I paid attention to my school teachers, learned a marketable trade, and become a more reliable provider. Instead, I had spent much of my boyhood creating an elaborate fantasy in my head and then allowing myself to become trapped in it for hours on end when I should have been acquiring an education.

After a moment or so, Andrea interrupted my mental journey back to the heyday of Cartouche and Analemma. “Well,” she said, “do you think I should get the kids a globe or not?”

“I’m thinking about it,” I told her. “Give me another minute.”