One Nation, Under God
One Nation, Under God
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I don’t know why I’m so enamored with snakes, but they’ve had a hold on me since I was a kid. They still do. Last week at the cabin I saw our 10-month-old springer Dot cautiously approach something in the yard. About the time I thought “snake,” it struck at her, missing by a foot, but putting her in retreat. It was a big, beautiful bull snake, vividly marked in gold and black and green. I was thrilled to have such a magnificent creature in my yard. Growing up, the only snakes in my yard were...
I recently read another article concerning the influx of new residents to Montana and what they should know in order to fit in out here. It’s a tired, overworked story. The reality of the situation is quite different. We have to adjust to them, not the other way around. While long-time Montana residents bemoan the flood of out-of-staters fleeing the places where they were born and spent their careers, those are the same folks we most often choose to lead us. Our governor is from New Jersey. O...
It was 86 degrees when we got to the lake. I hoped to fish the next day, but the wind rose at dusk and howled all night. At first light it was spitting rain, and after wrapping up some work on the cabin we decided to head home. While we were loading the truck Barb said she smelled smoke, and within a few minutes the landscape had disappeared under a blanket of haze. We hung around for a while hoping the source of the smoke wasn’t nearby. If a fire was close it would be here soon riding the roari... Full story
While pounding through the waves recently on Fort Peck Lake I couldn’t help but recall how many times I’d been here before. Not necessarily on Fort Peck, and certainly not in a boat this big, but for sure in waves large enough to give me pause. Probably the scariest were the trips Barb and I used to take on Yellowstone Lake where if anything happened and we ended up in the frigid water we were toast, or more accurately ice cubes. The wind at that elevation came up quickly and with little war...
I’ve been called a lot of things over the years, but this was a new one. A concerned reader, upset over my opinion in a recent column, referred to me as a self-righteous liberal. I was aghast. Me? Morally superior? I simply point out things I see and state an opinion on them. It’s not always even my opinion. Sometimes I just like to poke the bear. Makes for a better read. I hope my columns on occasion prompt discussion, even if it’s often what a jerk I must be to have written what I did. A colum...
While working in the yard yesterday I noticed a dark cloud approaching from the west. “It’s going to rain,” I thought to myself. The weather app on my phone affirmed my prediction. “Rain starting in six minutes,” it read, “continuing for 40 minutes.” I welcomed the moisture like I always do this time of year. April showers bring May flowers and all that. I should have known better. It hardly even spit, the dark clouds vanishing by the time they reached town. I miss rain. Especially in...
In the 1980s while hunting on the CMR National Wildlife Refuge I drove into Glasgow to pick up a friend who was arriving on Amtrak. On a bulletin board in the train station was a racist cartoon that caught my eye. Having grown up in southern Indiana I’d seen that sort of thing before, but this was particularly vile, especially in a public space. It colored how I’ve viewed Glasgow ever since, but that was more than 30 years ago, and times change, don’t they? Apparently not so much. Passing throu... Full story
I’ve always liked a room with a view, and I’ve had a few. The view out the front window of the apartment Barb and I rented on Willson Avenue in Bozeman always reminded me of a Courier & Ives print, especially in winter. The four-plex we lived in, however, was torn down a few years ago. Apparently, it didn’t fit the aesthetic of the neighborhood. The view out of our front window in Malta is somewhat similar. The prettiest house in town sits across the street surrounded by towering trees. The best...
Raising a young bird dog is always a challenge. Balancing a pup’s enthusiasm with enough discipline to maintain a handle can be difficult, especially when there are too many birds. That’s not typically a problem. But like a scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds, I found myself peering out the windows at the cabin last week to see if the coast was clear. It wasn’t. There were sharptail grouse feeding under the boat parked outside. There were grouse on the split rail fence across the road. T...
Our new governor seems intent on living out a country song. Hardy’s recent hit “Rednecker” comes to mind whenever Greg Gianforte makes the news. “My town’s smaller than your town/And I got a bigger buck and bass on my wall” A New Jersey transplant, Gianforte long ago gave up the silk shirts and gold chains of the Jersey shore for boots, jeans, and big belt buckles. Some might call him a poser, but the software developer seems to be doing everything he can lately to prove he’s just a regular guy...
At times I wonder what we were thinking. Like when I was getting dressed one day last week and discovered a hole in my sock that wasn’t there when I had taken it off the night before. Or yesterday when I was on my hands and knees in the living room mopping up a coke that had been sent flying after a high-speed collision between a TV tray and a dog bed. Or all the time I’ve spent cleaning up broken branches and tree bark that litter every room as if we’d been running a wood chipper inside the h...
It must be spring. The first grizzly bear of the year has emerged from hibernation in Yellowstone Park. I’m sure I ran into his relatives years ago. Grizzlies, more than any other animal, are a hallmark of wild country to me. I love knowing there’s still a critter out there that just might stalk and eat me. The first grizzly I saw in the park was at a distance. He was ambling through the sagebrush while I watched from the relative safety of a stand of trees a couple of hundred yards away. It was...
I’ve always been an avid reader. As a kid I was a big fan of the Hardy Boys mysteries, reading nearly every book in the series. Frank and Joe solved crimes, rode motorcycles, flew planes, even had their own boat. As I grew into my teens I still read the Hardy Boys, although by then it was more to laugh at the outdated language in the books than it was to lose myself in the predictable plot lines. The brothers and their “chums” frequently tailed “swarthy” characters, who typically glanced a...
It’s been a year this month since the world as we knew it changed. Barb and I were on vacation in San Diego but raced home to Montana when Covid-19 hit the fan. Except for a brief foray into Wyoming last summer I haven’t been out of the state since. My 33-year association with the Bozeman Chronicle ended that month when the paper dropped all of its columnists. My final column in the Chronicle, detailing our trip to California, is still displayed on the paper’s web site. The headline reads “Doin...
February used to be my favorite month. The shortest month of the year, February also signaled the end of winter for me. For years, Barb and I would head for warmer climes at the end of the month. While it might remain cold and snowy in Montana for a while yet, I didn’t care. I wouldn’t be back until spring. Then things changed. Instead of looking forward to dragging a boat clear across the country to Florida, I began to dread the trip. We seemed to always hit a blizzard in the Dakotas. Each yea...
I’ve always been suspicious of innovation, especially when it comes with a high price tag. When my wife paid $40 a few years ago for an insulated cup I was aghast. But when I found the cup sitting on the kitchen counter the next morning still full of ice I was sold. Soon I had my own pricey, well-insulated Yeti drinking cup. However, I can’t yet bring myself to spring for a Yeti cooler. It’s not that I can’t afford one, but $400 for an insulated box to put ice in seems a little silly conside...
I’m a gun guy I own rifles and pistols and shotguns. They run the gamut from single-shots, over-and-unders, and side-by-sides to semi-autos, pumps and bolt-actions. I inherited some, bought most, and received a few as gifts. Four months of the year I hunt, a loaded weapon in my hands more days than not. In the off-season I shoot clay targets with the shotguns and kill cans with the .22. Sometimes I fire my 9mm Italian cop rifle just to hear it go rat-a-tat-tat. That being said, I’m sick and tir...
I don’t put much stock in old wives tales and the like, choosing science over myth when given a choice. Unless, of course, it suits me. And an early spring always suits me. That’s why, on the second day of February every year for as long as I can remember, I anxiously watch the morning news to see if Punxsatawney Phil has seen his shadow. If so, the story goes, we’re in for six more weeks of winter. You’d think by now I’d know better. The Pennsylvania groundhog is only right about half of t...
I used to give bats no more thought than most folks do. They were just another interesting critter I caught fleeting glimpses of as they flitted about at dusk. Then I moved to Malta, home to the northernmost colony of migrating little brown bats in North America, and I became intimately familiar with them. The 100-year-old stone house we bought there was bat central. Trim was missing on a couple of second-floor windows giving them entry into the house, and while remodeling the place I found...
Republican lawmakers wasted little time in getting down to business on one of their top priorities: arming Montana college students. Less than two weeks after the Legislature began its session, a bill that would allow concealed carry of firearms on public college campuses passed a vote by the GOP-controlled House. The bill now proceeds to the Senate. The idea is that armed students could prevent mass shooting incidents on campus. No one would start popping caps in Abnormal Psychology 101...
Admittedly, I’m a bit of a Luddite. I don’t tweet, blog or Zoom. But I do have a favorite device: the radio. I prefer the immediacy it provides. Always have. Although the news app on my phone offers a plethora of options for keeping up with the outside world, I’m content to listen to a single news broadcast at the top of every hour. It’s more than enough, especially in these troubled times. Since this all began last March, Barb and I have been keeping to ourselves, something I’m much more comf...
If I can hang on just a little longer, like magic it will be gone. My fears will vanish, and I’ll be able to stand proudly upright once again. In the meantime I’m terrified. I’m of an age that any day could be my last. As careful as I try to be I still slip up occasionally. Literally. And then I fall down. For 60 days I chased the dogs up hill and through dale, a loaded shotgun in my hands, safely navigating the uneven terrain. On the 61st I got my comeuppance. Following pheasant tracks in a...
It’s been a while since I’ve fallen through the ice, but late-season pheasant hunting always carries that risk. I didn’t expect any problems this year. It had been dry for months and the freeze came early. Every stock pond and marsh up here had good, thick ice by December. The slow-moving Milk River was almost entirely frozen over. Almost. Hunting with friends last week along the river west of town I heard a shot and watched a rooster drop out of sight over the bank. “Great,” I said to myself...
“Dot was drinking the Christmas tree water again,” Ace said, eyeing the puppy with disdain. “That’s no big deal,” I told him. “I’ll be taking it down soon anyway.” “She also has one of your shoes,” he said. “Maybe you should start minding your own business and not minding hers,” I replied. “I don’t have any business,” he shot back. “I’m just helping you.” “Thanks, but I think I’ve got it under control,” I said. “Try to relax.” “I can’t,” he said with a low growl. “That’s true,” I had to admi...
It took a while, but I’ve finally turned into that guy. My friends and I used to poke fun at older dudes who no longer hunted big game, didn’t care if they bagged a limit of birds, and were as pleased with the fluidity of their casts as they were with what was biting the end of their line. I couldn’t imagine life without elk, a game bag full of birds, or a fishless outing. I used to take great pride in harvesting an elk every fall. Back then I could walk forever, and I shot a lot of elk miles...
