Unexpected roadtrip finds

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

I never know what I’ll find on the road — for example, I was driving through Georgia and whizzed past this enormous peach on a pole.

In a more literary vein, later on I heard Mississippi public radio promote its upcoming special on Eudora Welty (to broadcast Sunday, May 25, or online here). Recorded at Symphony Space in New York earlier this month as part of the Selected Shorts series, the special includes readings of three Welty stories, biographer Suzanne Marrs and, as emcee, writer Ann Patchett. Guided tours of Welty’s home in Jackson, Miss., are available Wednesdays-Fridays with advance reservations.

Still further down the road — Interstate 10, to be exact — after crossing from Mississippi into Louisiana, I suddenly found myself on the Stephen E. Ambrose Memorial Parkway. Ambrose, who died of cancer five years ago, wrote the well-known WWII books ‘Band of Brothers’ and ‘D-Day.’ To honor his work with the National D-Day Museum in New Orleans, a segment of the I-10 was renamed for the famed historian in 2004. Which makes sense, but it certainly was a surprise.

Carolyn Kellogg