Tennessee, Kentucky, and Virginia Trip by Ruth Paget

Tennessee, Kentucky, and Virginia Trip by Ruth Paget 

In 1979, my Pennington grandma began to nag my mother that I had been to communist China and fancy French and British Montreal, Canada during my freshman year of high school without visiting her in Pennington Gap, Virginia. 

“I know Ruth would like to visit aristocratic England, but tell her Pennington Gap is like Scotland where the royals are educated,” she might have said to my mother. 

In any case, my mother drove from Detroit, Michigan down to Pennington Gap, Virginia and then out to Robbins Chapel (another surname from my family tree) where the Pennington cousins were staying for the summer. 

Robbins Chapel, Virginia is about one mile away from Kentucky and three miles away from Tennessee. Pennington Gap leads to all points west. 

Pennington Gap was different from Kentucky and Tennessee according to my grandmother: 

“We’re midway up the Appalachians. We’re ridge runners not hillbillies like those people in Tennessee and Kentucky. Hillbillies got rich making moonshine and running it up to New York during the Prohibition. They still hide their ill-gotten gains.” 

“The Penningtons are church. Your Pennington ancestor, Isaac Penington, was the father-in-law of William Penn. Our family started as Quakers, but we’re Baptist now.” 

My petite grandma could be daunting, so I did not ask if the Penningtons got rich being overseers in coal mines in Virginia. 

After the welcome lecture, my cousins and I were allowed to play games and amuse ourselves. 

In the mornings, we would walk down to the general store, which had a pool table in the back room. We played all morning and drank Dr. Pepper soda while being Vegas. We would walk up the hill to our various relatives’ houses for lunch. Then, we would play several rounds of croquet on the hillside for physical exercise. In the late afternoon, we would play rummy with the aunts while waiting for the male relatives to get back from golf.  At night, we would play kick-the-can, a version of hide and seek where you kick a can up and hide in a fixed spot when the can hits the ground.

Besides games, my Aunt J. taught me how to can blackberries to make the blackberry gravy (jam) that I loved to eat for breakfast on biscuits. That alone was worth the trip to Pennington Gap. She also took me to the family graveyard to help me do genealogical work. She had also done this and was helping me fill in the gaps on the family tree I had been working on. 

Sometimes we would go to Kingsport, Tennessee to visit the stockbroker. I loved watching the ticker tape spit out of the ticker tape machine. 

Other times we would go to Kentucky for lunch. Kentucky looked like Pennington Gap, but had more Pentecostal Churches. “The Pentecostals handle rattlesnakes without fear, because they are holy,” Aunt J. told me. 

I thought Appalachia was more dangerous than Detroit and was glad to be with my family. 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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St. Louis, Missouri Trip by Ruth Paget

St. Louis, Missouri Trip by Ruth Paget 

As a child, I traveled around the Midwestern United States with my mother, who was an elected Secretary-Treasurer of the Midwest Conference of the International Typographical Union (a forerunner of the Communication Workers of America) as well as a union organizer. 

Many of the conferences were held in Detroit, where we lived. For other meetings, mom drove her black Thunderbird with rock and roll blaring while drinking a Fresca (a carbonated grapefruit drink that was low in calories). 

I liked staying in hotels with pools and did not mind reading while the conferences were going on. Some of the infinitely cool places we visited include: 

-Toledo, Ohio 

-Cleveland, Ohio

-Cincinnati, Ohio 

-Gary, Indiana 

-Indianapolis, Indiana 

-Chicago, Illinois 

-St. Louis, Missouri 

Even if a meeting were held at O’Hare Airport in Chicago, my mom drive up Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago to get to the airport, so we could model white-rimmed sunglasses while listening to rock music. The Detroiters were in Chicago. 

My mom would tell me Detroit insider music information that her fiends in bands told her such as:

-“Everyone in the music industry knows that the Pontiac Silverdome has 82,666 seats that they can fill with people who will buy at least one $20 T-shirt.” 

“People who sell rock merchandise need to sell sunglasses.” 

“Rock concerts would sell out faster, if they could get an army of salesman to sell on commission as a side-job.” 

Today, she would probably agree that online boutiques are a great way to sell 24/7/365. I think her remarks encouraged me to become a member of the Major Activities Board (Concert Board) when I was a student at the University of Chicago. 

The place I remember best from these travels, though, is St. Louis (Missouri) for its Gateway Arch, designed by architect Eero Saarinen. My mom told me it was the tallest arch in the world. 

Even as a child, I knew it was a doorway to a big land with high mountains in the West. 

As an adult, I like living in the Western United States in California where it is okay to write, cook, and use technology. 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Helen, Georgia Trip by Ruth Paget

Helen, Georgia Trip by Ruth Paget 

On our last trip to Atlanta, Laurent and I drove to Helen located in Northeastern Georgia in the Appalachian Mountains. I wanted to visit Georgia’s Wine Country along the state’s agritourism trail. 

The agritourism route to Helen goes through the Chattahooche National Forest and the Unicoi and Smithgall Woods State Parks. Wine tasting rooms line the way along with inns advertising live music in the evenings. 

Cherokee Native Americans were Helen’s original inhabitants followed by gold miners and lumber industry workers. 

The Chattahooche River runs through Helen, which is built to resemble a Bavarian town. There is plenty of paid parking, which prompted us to eat at the Troll Tavern and Restaurant for its free parking. 

The Troll has a terrace right beside the Chattahooche River that rushes all the way to Atlanta. 

During the day, you order at the counter and a server brings you your order. I asked Laurent for a Wiener Schnitzel combo platter like we used to get when we lived in Germany. 

Laurent went to order and came back to photograph Bavarian flags in the distance and the river. 

The server arrived and placed a combo plate in front of me: a hot dog in a bun, potato chips, and coleslaw. Laurent smiled at me, knowing he was being a troll at the Troll Tavern. 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Smyrna, Georgia Trips by Ruth Paget

Smyrna, Georgia Trips by Ruth Paget 

My husband Laurent and I have been on five business trips to Atlanta, Georgia over five years. We always stay in Smyrna, famous for its restored downtown all painted in white and its huge Cumberland Mall with the Chattahooche River and park running by it. 

We always started our stays with a trip to Costco to buy lunch food. I have eaten a lot of Caesar Salad and blueberry muffins in middle age. 

We would go to dinner at Cracker Barrel and Marietta Diner, featured by Guy Fieri on television. For fancy weekend dinners with my family, we would go to Maggiano’s, Cheesecake Factory, and Carraba’s – all by Cumberland Mall. I liked to eat at Applebee’s, too, but Laurent preferred fish at Cracker Barrel. 

The best thing about Smyrna is Cumberland Avenue. If you turned a left from our hotel, you could drive all the way out to Blue Ridge at the foot of the Appalachian Mountains on it. If you turned right from the hotel, you could take Cumberland Avenue straight downtown to CNN. 

There was an apartment complex over Cumberland Avenue right as you entered Atlanta. I would have liked to live there, if I were younger. There is a Kroger Supermarket and dry cleaners and alteration store on Cumberland Avenue nearby. You need both of those to work well in a city as well as a garage. 

I always brought projects to work on during these trips. I treated them like writing sabbaticals and got my eight books typed, proofed, edited, and placed on Kindle along with writing 500 publicity blogs. Atlanta’s heat kept me in the room working. 

I liked going to Cost Plus World Market when Laurent was done working to buy souvenirs such as coffee, books, and biscotti. 

I still view Atlanta as place to get things done, buy nice souvenirs, and eat well. 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Utah Vacations by Ruth Paget

Utah Vacations by Ruth Paget 

I have happily visited Utah five times with my husband Laurent in the 2010s on business trips. Ruth, the stage mother, knew that the Sundance Institute is located in the mountains outside Salt Lake City. 

So, on the first free weekend of our trips to Utah, we always drove out to Sundance to buy merchandise for our daughter Florence Paget, who was studying playwriting at Juilliard in New York. 

Our first Sundance purchase was knit cap with the word “Sundance” knit in it. I wrote my mother in Wisconsin to get a picture of Florence in her Sundance cap with a snowman. (My mom is a stage grandma and got this done right away.) 

Some of our other fun Sundance purchases include: 

-snow jackets -a leather journal with Sundance embossed on the cover 

-Western scarves book 

-Wilderness knives with corkscrews 

-Cowboy doodle books 

-paper journals for project management 

After shopping, we would go to the café for fizzy, non-caffeinated soft drinks and muffins. We would look over our purchases and discuss them. I am a stage mom who will sell film downloads, tickets, and merchandise for my family’s products, so I like discussing markets and merchandise sales. 

Once we had visited Sundance, we would drive into Park City to eat a more substantial meal at El Chabusco Mexican restaurant. You order at the counter here and a restaurant worker will bring it to you when it is ready. El Chabusco has lots of sauces on its buffet counter. I stir mango-pepper sauce into my refried beans and cilantro-lime sauce into my rice for extra kick. I like shredded chicken or cheese enchiladas with tomatillo sauce for lunch. 

After our meal at El Chabusco, we would walk down a few doors to Einstein Brother Bagels to order bagels for dinner. I could relive my youth in Detroit (Michigan) here when I would go to suburban Southfield for bagels – onion in winter and salt in summer with lots of cream cheese. 

On other weekends during our trips over five years, Laurent and I would visit one of Utah’s many national parks: 

-Arches – This national park was made famous as an Apple screensaver and mousepad. It is scorching hot, so make sure to bring water, a hat, and sunscreen. 

-Zion – The massive tablelands in this park were created by erosion, exposing layers of varying colors of red rock. The mesas (tables) glisten in the sun and are very photogenic. 

-Bryce Canyon – Famous for its hoo doos or rock chimneys that you can view from above. You can drive through the hoo doos on the valley floor as well. The valley landscape resembles Mars with red rocks and red soil. 

-Canyonlands – These are vast and sizzling hot even in a car with air conditioning. The Colorado River cuts through this area carrying red soil with it. 

-Sandy – This is not a national park, but has dramatic scenery in a mining area. The California Tectonic Plate collides with the North America Tectonic Plate here and creates towering pillars that surround you as you go through the mountains on a one-lane free on stilts. 

Utah has many areas for skiing and zip lining (Sundance has a zip line) in addition to historic and cultural centers in downtown Salt Lake City. 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Montana and South Dakota Trip by Ruth Paget

Montana and South Dakota Trip by Ruth Paget 

In 1973, my dad took me on a trip to Glacier National Park in Montana during the Watergate Trial. We left from Detroit, Michigan and set out for an overnight stay in Minnesota with one of his pen pals from Field and Stream magazine (their mutual interest was fishing in the wilderness). 

I woke drowsily after the overnight stay in Minnesota, but became wide-eyed once I hit the van for a day’s worth of travel through the Badlands of South Dakota and Montana. Dad turned on the radio coverage of the Watergate Trial. He was a Republican and commented on the commentators, “Politics just ruins good people like Richard Nixon.” 

“What about the robbers?” I asked. “They’ll be found guilty. No one will know them or know anything about the robbery,” dad remarked. 

Prairie dogs raced in front of the car in the Badlands. I kept asking dad to slow down and not squash the prairie dogs. The speed limit was 75 miles per hour then, so we were flying and squashing away. 

“I’ll get in an accident, if I slow down for all them, Ruthie,” he said. 

We were both transfixed by the moon-like landscape. Vast rock plateaus were broken up by higher rock plateaus with caves in the landscape. I thought snakes might live in the caves. 

I thought it took forever to get through South Dakota and Montana was a longer state I saw as we crossed the state line. Dad stopped at the visitor center where I picked up travel brochures. Glacier was the big deal in Montana. Dad gave me saltine crackers with liverwurst to eat in the car. 

I looked at one of the travel brochures for Butte, Montana and asked dad, “Are we going to Butt, Montana?” 

“That’s not how you say that,” dad said. “Okay, are we going to Booty, Montana, then?” I asked. “That is pronounce ‘byut.’ It’s a French word meaning ‘hill.’ The French were the original European explorers in this area, “ dad said.

I sat chuckling at my kid joke.

“We’re going way up north right to the Canadian border to see Glacier National Park,” dad said. 

There were towering pine trees at the entrance to Glacier that cut off the sun. 

 “We’re going up the ice mountain now,” dad said. 

We went up, up, and up. I looked down at the pine trees, which became progressively smaller the higher up we went. The pine trees looked like stick trees you put on a Christmas mantelpiece we were up so high. I was glad to read the summit. 

We went to a picnic area where dad took out his Coleman gas stove and made a breakfast-dinner in Lodge cookware. He filled his Coleman thermos with coffee several times. We breathed in the thin, high-altitude air. 

With a belly full of bacon, I agree to go to Banff National Forest in Canada, so we could see Canadian pine trees and say we’d been to Canada. 

Even as a kid, I knew dad was thinking the Glacier vacation was ice, pine trees, and dead prairie dogs.

Dad carefully drove down the steep glaciers that had patches of water on them from melting snow. I fell asleep and woke up in South Dakota. 

Dad turned on the Watergate Trial when I woke up. 

I told dad, “I want to be president. I think I can do a better job than this.” 

“It’s all headache,” dad said.

“But, I think I could do it. And, I’ve traveled internationally after this trip. I have a head start on international affairs,” I said. 

We both were laughing about Canadian pine trees. 

Surprisingly, my non-feminist dad said, “Study hard, and even if you’re not president, you’ll still be able to do something you like eventually.” 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Denver, Colorado Trip by Ruth Paget

Denver, Colorado Trip by Ruth Paget 

I had transferred through Denver International Airport several times before finally getting to accompany my husband Laurent on a business trip there when he had a teaching assignment at the U.S. Air Force Academy outside Denver, Colorado. 

The plane ride in through the Rockies was very bumpy with only jagged mountain peaks as emergency landing sites. I was happy to be on terra firma when we arrived at the airport. 

Our hotel was in a remote convention area with rows of every major hotel chain on one side of a wide road with every major bar-restaurant chain represented on the other side of the road. We unpacked and set out to eat at Bennigan’s and noted where Kentucky Fried Chicken was. 

We arrived at Bennigan’s at 3 p.m. and were told the dining room was closed, but could eat in the bar area. We ordered a mushroom-cheese pizza and big Patron margaritas. Denver vegetarian pizzas come with whole pickled mushrooms. The pizza was different from Monterey (California) where we lived, but equally delicious. 

We came to Denver in the midst of the political campaign between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. There were tons of political ads on the TV along with ads to legalize marijuana (Colorado-speak for cannabis). 

While Laurent taught during the day, I treated the remote location as a secluded writing sabbatical. I wrote new blogs and edited and proofed books. The time passed quickly this way, and I seemed to get little done. 

When the weekend rolled around, Laurent and I set out for Colorado Springs. My mother had served on the Board of Trustees for the Union Printer’s Home there for many years as an elected trustee, and I wanted to see the place. 

We ran into a terrible traffic jam. We turned on the radio to see what was wrong to find out that then-candidate Donald Trump was speaking in Colorado Springs. Trump supporters and anti-Trump protesters were descending. There were out-of-state and Mexican license plates on the road, too. I did not want to crash a potential riot in a stand-your-ground state with people who wanted open-carry for guns. 

Laurent exited the highway and came back on the other side. We went to the Tanger Outlet Malls and bought Ralph Lauren Polo Shirts. I was happy with those as souvenirs. 

Denver is a huge railroad junction where you can find almost anything or have it delivered pretty quickly. I spent the rest of my time in Colorado writing and enjoyed the Marriott Hotel’s set-up-for technology and Internet hotel room. 

By Ruth Paget, author Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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