One Nation, Under God
One Nation, Under God
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The transition to one dog is easier than I thought it would be. For years we’ve been a multiple-dog family. We had as many as four at one time. Now it’s just Dot. When I’m hunting it’s no longer a case of which dog to watch or follow, there’s only one. Also, the dog food bill dropped precipitously, and there’s less recycled dog food to pick up in the yard. I fear, however, that I’m following in the footsteps of my friend E-dub, who’s given up bird dogs completely. He still has a rescue mutt fro...
I recently came to the realization that any more work on our backyard building project in Livingston would have to be done by me. Hiring anyone to do roofing or drywall is next to impossible. While there are plenty of local contractors offering such services, they’re too busy to even stop by and give me a bid. One company did send me a contract, but their roofing bid was based on a Google Earth shot of our house which didn’t include the sewing shed in question. I told them I wanted a real per...
Run for your lives. The killer deer are coming. Montana’s general big game season ended this week leaving a lot of hunters with unfilled mule deer tags. Wildlife officials say there’s been a drop in the statewide muley population for the last three years. I think they’re all just looking for deer in the wrong places. Try my yard in Livingston, my cabin on Fort Peck or the entire town of Malta where some folks have begun to fear for their lives. “Is it going to take someone getting killed for you...
My Facebook feed has been filled recently with photos of rustic shelters, most of which are accompanied by text declaring them the perfect homes. I beg to differ. Having lived in some rather basic shacks and cabins over the years, I’ve found that the romantic notion of such accommodations quickly fades. A dugout with a pole roof covered with moss doesn’t call to me. My first home in Cooke City was an old cabin with low ceilings that was built into the mountainside. It was warm and cozy if the...
I have a friend who always disappears around this time of year. “When you can’t find him he’s out killin’ stuff,” an old buddy of ours used to say. It’s true. The closer the end of the season, the scarcer my friend is to find, and without a doubt “he’s out killin’ stuff.” The general big game hunting season wraps up the Sunday following Thanksgiving. Until then there a lot of hunters still looking to fill tags. “Git yer elk yet?” is an often-heard query at the bar, the gas pump, the grocery s...
My buddy Smoke missed a big bull elk last week. His first shot was high. There was no second shot. The extractor on his rifle failed to grab the empty brass. He worked the bolt to no avail as he watched the bull run by at 100 yards. Now he’s haunted by that image. “I can still see him,” Smoke told me, as he wiped away a tear. Hunt long enough and something similar will happen to you. We’re haunted by our misses. Who hasn’t seen the tail end of an elk or deer or pheasant — that earlier off...
I’m a sucker for compliments, but they have to be somewhat based on reality. Tell me I look pretty today I’ll blush, and bat my eyes knowing full well it’s nonsense. Tell me I’m “handy,” however, and I’m at your service. That was the compliment I received recently from the electrical contractor wiring my latest building project. If I could help the electrician, it would save me a few bucks on the job, he said. “Whatever you need,” I replied, suddenly full of myself without any idea of what lay...
I don’t like to think I’m slipping. While I’ll readily admit I’m not as strong or fast as I once was, I can still accomplish most tasks without looking like an old man. Or so I think. The backyard building project — Barb’s sewing shed — is coming along fine, despite a few setbacks. I had apparently forgotten how to do some things, at least correctly, but consoled myself with the old builder’s axiom “good enough for who it’s for.” Like sausage, the shed will be great when it’s finished but you...
Out for a morning walk during a recent trip to Australia I struck up a conversation with three 10-year-old boys who were fishing the Patalawonga River near Adelaide. I asked what they were catching. “Brim and bass,” they told me. Recognizing my accent, they asked if I was from the U.S. “Montana,” I replied. “Do you have any automatic weapons?” they asked in unison, eagerly awaiting my reply. “No,” I said, explaining automatic weapons remain off-limits to most Americans. “Do you have Jolly Ra...
There are two Montanas. One struggles to control rampant development and growth. The other simply struggles to survive. Plans for a destination resort on 90 acres in Park County’s Paradise Valley are drawing heat from local residents. The development, which includes 100 cabins, a restaurant and retail space, will change the character of the area, they say. Opposition is growing. In Phillips County, where development is lacking and population is declining, there isn’t enough money to pay she...
Montana is known for extreme weather: raging blizzards, ferocious winds, bone-numbing cold. It was at Rogers Pass, after all, where the coldest temperature in the Lower 48 was recorded. Unpredictability was the state’s calling card, Chinook winds turned frigid January days balmy in a matter of minutes, early September snowstorms put an abrupt end to summer. Montana, like at least a dozen other states, embraced the saying “If you don’t like the weather, wait 15 minutes.” That was then. This is...
I don’t know what I was thinking. Instead of hunting every day since the season opened like I’ve done for the last 20 years, I took on a building project. In September. It might have simply been an effort on my part to prove to my wife that I can do more than hunt in the fall. Now I’m paying the price. After pounding nails for three weeks I can’t hit the broadside of a barn, let alone a bird on the wing. My dog’s motor is stuck on high, and neither of us is in shape. Dot quit after hunting two h...
After hunting the first two days of the season, I traded the shotgun for a tool belt and went to work. I told Barb I could get her sewing room enclosed in a couple of weeks. It didn’t quite happen, but the framing is done, the roof is on, and she’s off to Toronto for an authors’ conference. I’ll hunt while she’s gone, and finish up the work when she gets back. I designed the building so that I could pretty much do it by myself. Barb helped me stand up the walls. Other than that, it was just...
I’m having a difficult time accepting the perks of aging. While I don’t hesitate to ask for senior discounts when available, I’m less apt to accept help in physical matters. At the lumber yard last week, a concerned clerk offered to carry four small boxes of nails and a roll of tape to the cash register for me. “Thanks,” I told him, “I’ve got it.” He then asked what I was working on and when I told him it was a roof he said: “Hey, you be careful.” I don’t know what prompted his concern. I was dr...
I reserve a block of time to hunt every fall. It’s typically the whole season. My wife used to push back a bit, but in recent years has relented, finally realizing, I suppose, that four months of me gone most days is a pretty good deal. This fall I’m paying her back. Instead of hunting I’m building. We sold our house in Malta last summer forcing us to downsize. What didn’t fit in our cabin on the lake we divided between the office we still have in Malta, and the small house we bought a couple...
I set the alarm for five, confident I wouldn’t need it. I didn’t. Waking ten minutes early I turned off the alarm and got dressed. Nearly every opening morning for the last 18 years the routine has been the same. So has the place. It’s hallowed ground. Scout died after she was bitten by a rattlesnake there in 2006. I buried Jem there four years ago. He too, suffered a snakebite along the same creek bottom, but survived and lived to the ripe old age of 14. Spot and Ruth and Ace — all of them go...
The start of hunting season almost caught me by surprise this year. Almost. After selling our house in Malta and all the moving that entailed, followed by a trip to Australia, I’d been occupied with other thoughts. Lately, they’ve been centered around jet lag recovery — like why am I wide awake in the middle of the night? I suspect it’s related to the Saturday we lost at the start of the trip. Flying out of Bozeman on a Friday morning we spent 18 hours in the air, somehow arriving in Sydney...
I am a sucker for zoos. Tell me you’ve got some sort of exotic critter in a cage out back and I’ll cough up a few bucks to see it. To that end, I’ve visited some marvelous zoos in this country and across the globe. The San Diego Zoo tops my list closely followed by the Royal Dutch Zoo in Amsterdam and the Emperor Valley Zoo in Port of Spain, Trinidad. Woodland Park Zoo is a must-see whenever I’m in Seattle, as is the Living Desert Zoo and Gardens when Barb and I visit Palm Springs. Atlanta...
My wardrobe has changed little over the last two decades: Shorts and T-shirts in summer; Carhartts and wool shirts in winter. Dressing up means a clean shirt with a collar, and jeans. Even on vacation that wardrobe changed little. Until now. Tomorrow I board a flight to Australia. My talented wife is being honored at an authors conference in Adelaide, and I’m tagging along. While Barb — wearing fashionable attire — attends events at the conference, I’m free to explore. Carhartts should suffice...
Staying fit isn’t easy, especially as I grow older. It becomes harder all the time to avoid my slothful ways. To that end my smart watch keeps track of my daily exercise goals, encouraging me to step it up if I’m falling short, and praising me when a goal is achieved. “Take a 20-minute walk to close your exercise and move goals,” the watch will tell me as I’m curled up on the couch with a beer. I rarely respond. While I typically start the day with good intentions, by noon I’ve lost most of my...
I remember being told years ago that if assault rifles were banned, my semi-automatic shotgun would be next. It was meant to scare me into joining the fight against gun control even though I didn’t understand why most folks needed a military-style weapon in the first place. I still don’t. But I’m apparently in the minority. It used to be that the majority of gun owners were hunters or folks who kept a handgun for “home security.” While military weapons were coveted by collectors, they weren’t t...
Barb and I moved to Malta nearly twenty years ago fleeing the rampant growth that was just beginning to take off in the Gallatin Valley. We bought an old house and an office building in town, and settled into life on the Hi-line. Barb wrote while I renovated the buildings, grew a big garden, and hunted. Yesterday I walked out the door for the last time, leaving the house that I’d lived in longer than any other. One last load of boxes, tools, and furniture filled the pickup and flatbed t...
Cleaning out the house has been a chore. It takes time to go through twenty years of accumulation of stuff, some of it worth saving, most of it not. A lot of it came with us when we moved from Bozeman, including a box labeled rocks and another labeled iron. Opening them for the first time in decades I was disappointed to find they were just that — a box of relatively unremarkable rocks and old horseshoes. What had I been thinking? At least it was easy to dispose of them. Another rock is more dif...
I stepped out my back door last week to be greeted by a flag bearing the f-word in foot-high letters. It was mounted on a decrepit vehicle parked next to my property, and only steps away from the gymnasium where children had attended a basketball camp earlier that day. I wondered if they had seen it. The flag was political in intent, but obscene on purpose. Some idiot, I’m sure, thought they were being funny. I didn’t. I was mad, and a bit disappointed to see such a public display of obs...
I’ve had some pretty prestigious Montana addresses. General Delivery, Cooke City was my first, and it’s still hard to beat. Tucked into the valley of Soda Butte Creek, surrounded by snow-capped peaks, Cooke is only a couple of miles up the road from Yellowstone Park. I’ve also called Livingston home, and probably will again. Like Cooke, it has spectacular mountain views, and while Yellowstone is a few more miles up the road, it’s still close. For a few years, Barb and I lived in Bozeman on Will...