Robert B. Simpson: Ride and learn

Road trips can be entertaining and educational. Not to mention boring, exhausting, and sometimes frightening. I learned that all over again during the recent Thanksgiving period. My son and I traveled together to Michigan, making the jaunt north straight through in 16 grueling hours, the return in two less stressful days.

I was reminded once again that Tennessee and Kentucky both have some beautiful mountain scenery, accessible only in brief glimpses between the long bodies of eighteen wheelers as they hurtle past or linger beside you. Even the brief glimpses are often marred by massive billboards scattered across the hills. Still, it's good to know that the hills are still there.

Atlanta has to be the most aggravating city I've ever had to drive through, especially during rush hour, which apparently lasts from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. Running it a close second, though, is the city of Cincinnati, Ohio. While Atlanta's race course, commonly called the I-285 By-Pass, sometimes offers some relief, or at least variety, to drivers overwhelmed by its traffic, I've found no such way around Cincinnati. There you simply move in brief spurts for what seems like hours, picking up speed occasionally, only to have to brake fiercely while hoping the guy behind you doesn't end up in your back seat.

In the old days, I drove through a good part of the continental United States guided by nothing more than a service station road map. I don't recall having much trouble finding my way, although I may have had to back-track a few times when I'd taken a wrong turn. But modern trips seem almost undoable without the aid of a GPS. Those installed in cars a few years ago were expensive and required expensive software updates, but now an iPhone in a car with Bluetooth technology does the job better and at no cost. And no requirement for software updates. But evidently even the simpler and less expensive system will never allow me to escape the voice of that woman who keeps insisting that I make a U-turn and go back and do what she told me to do earlier. This is especially maddening when you're trying to dodge 18-wheelers that threaten to crush you as you work your way through Cincinnati.

We enjoyed our holiday visit with my daughter and her family, and Ann Arbor itself is a pleasant city. Still, to me it seemed chilly. I wore a jacket a lot and slept under heavy cover. My daughter and her husband, though, thought the weather quite balmy and opened the windows occasionally to cool the place down a little. My grandsons were inclined to wear shorts instead of long pants. I dressed for winter and shivered.

Much as we hated to say goodbye, even in the chill, our leave-taking couldn't have come at a better time. The University of Michigan was playing Ohio State that day, and my daughter lives five blocks from the stadium. A car was waiting for my parking place in front of her house as I drove away. Lines of traffic crawled for many blocks as people searched for space that hadn't already been claimed overnight. Thirty bucks per car for space on somebody's lawn seemed about average. Not being addicted to college football, I found all this new, highly interesting, and entertaining.

But the most fascinating incident of the whole trip had taken place near the beginning. My son and I stopped for breakfast somewhere north of Atlanta in mid-morning of the northbound leg of our journey. And there at Shoney's breakfast bar, for the first time in my life I saw who I assumed must be the good guy with a gun Wayne LaPierre of the NRA has told us is the solution to gunfire attacks by a bad guy with a gun. A man who had to be in his eighties, bald, white fringe of hair, got up from his booth and limped back to the food bar with a plate in his right hand, his cane in his left, and his pistol dangling from his belt in a holster on his left side. I wondered, in the event of an attack, whether he would drop his cane first or his food, but fortunately he didn't have to make that decision while we were still there, within a few feet of him. I did feel safer, though. After I was back in the car, that is.

Road trips are endlessly educational and entertaining.

Robert B. Simpson, a 28-year Infantry veteran who retired as a colonel at Fort Benning, is the author of "Through the Dark Waters: Searching for Hope and Courage."

This story was originally published December 5, 2015 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Robert B. Simpson: Ride and learn ."