Lost her last year and miss her every day. Can’t bear to take my weekly Sunday reminder to call her off my phone.
Almost 60 years ago she took me, as a young kid, on a most amazing summer trip. It was right after the Civil War centennial and I was obsessed with that war from a very young age after hearing my grandparents talk about their ancestors who served on both sides. I tried to read everything about the war that I could get my hands on.
My dad had to work that summer, but after Little League season was over, I begged my mom to take me to see some of the battlefields I'd been reading about. Surprisingly, she was game. She packed me, my grandmother, and my little sister in our old beat up station wagon and we took a twelve day driving loop throughout the South.
I sat in the front passenger seat and my mother let me navigate using old Enco maps. I learned to read those maps really quickly on that trip (a skill I'm afraid I haven't passed on very well to my kids in this GPS era). We stopped at battlefields at Vicksburg, Atlanta, Chickamauga, Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge in Chattanooga, Nashville, Fort Donelson and Fort Henry, and Shiloh, while in the back seat my grandmother patiently knitted her blankets and my sister read books. My mom let me pick the motels we stayed in using a Mobil travelguide. Of course I was always looking for the 3 1/2 star one with the biggest swimming pool.
I still remember walking those hot battlefields, wondering what the deal was with segregated restrooms at the filling stations, constantly getting on and off partially completed new Interstate highways, the old man who took us through Andrew Jackson's house the Hermitage in Nashville, eating shrimp remoulade for the first time at an above-average Holiday Inn in Alabama, seeing a cannon ball from the war still lodged in a Vicksburg building, and anticipating the inevitable swim in the pool at the motel each night.
It was a very different America to travel in back then. Regional differences were much more pronounced without the homogenizing effects of MacDonalds, Dennys, and Wal-Marts. You couldn't bypass most little towns and had to drive right down the main street to see what if anything each had to offer. Of course the Internet or message boards where I could talk about that trip were decades in the future, but that trip helped inspire a lifelong love of travel and history. Still can’t believe she did it. Only hope other OBs are so lucky. Thanks Mom.
Almost 60 years ago she took me, as a young kid, on a most amazing summer trip. It was right after the Civil War centennial and I was obsessed with that war from a very young age after hearing my grandparents talk about their ancestors who served on both sides. I tried to read everything about the war that I could get my hands on.
My dad had to work that summer, but after Little League season was over, I begged my mom to take me to see some of the battlefields I'd been reading about. Surprisingly, she was game. She packed me, my grandmother, and my little sister in our old beat up station wagon and we took a twelve day driving loop throughout the South.
I sat in the front passenger seat and my mother let me navigate using old Enco maps. I learned to read those maps really quickly on that trip (a skill I'm afraid I haven't passed on very well to my kids in this GPS era). We stopped at battlefields at Vicksburg, Atlanta, Chickamauga, Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge in Chattanooga, Nashville, Fort Donelson and Fort Henry, and Shiloh, while in the back seat my grandmother patiently knitted her blankets and my sister read books. My mom let me pick the motels we stayed in using a Mobil travelguide. Of course I was always looking for the 3 1/2 star one with the biggest swimming pool.
I still remember walking those hot battlefields, wondering what the deal was with segregated restrooms at the filling stations, constantly getting on and off partially completed new Interstate highways, the old man who took us through Andrew Jackson's house the Hermitage in Nashville, eating shrimp remoulade for the first time at an above-average Holiday Inn in Alabama, seeing a cannon ball from the war still lodged in a Vicksburg building, and anticipating the inevitable swim in the pool at the motel each night.
It was a very different America to travel in back then. Regional differences were much more pronounced without the homogenizing effects of MacDonalds, Dennys, and Wal-Marts. You couldn't bypass most little towns and had to drive right down the main street to see what if anything each had to offer. Of course the Internet or message boards where I could talk about that trip were decades in the future, but that trip helped inspire a lifelong love of travel and history. Still can’t believe she did it. Only hope other OBs are so lucky. Thanks Mom.
