I was recently asked "what is it about Montana that causes you to make your way out there so often"? I love that question! It gives me the opportunity to lower the bucket into the well of memories that I've made.
My first introduction to Montana came in the form of two movies. A River Runs Through It and Legends of the Fall. Both movies were set in Helena, Montana amidst the Elk Horn Mountains. Both movies were about a broken person (both played by Brad Pitt). Although both characters were flawed in many ways, they found their sense of peace in the water and mountains that are called Big Sky. I think the brokenness of the characters were always something I could related to. In those films, the scenery along the famed Missouri and Blackfoot Rivers cannot be described with words like beautiful; the words honestly escape me. Reruns continue to draw my desires to Big Sky.
So how did Montana become apart of me? Interestingly enough, it started at an auctioneer convention in Las Vegas. Attending alone to acquire post licensing education, I exited my class wondering what I was going to do in the city of lights and high hopes. In my class was Dan Pate, who I had never met
before. He recognized that I was alone and invited me to a nice meal with his partner Leah. As we got to know each other, he shared with me the world of growing up in Helena, Montana. I listened as his words created imaginative pictures in my mind. The life he grew up was at the base of the Elkhorn Mountains where cattle was more plentiful that humans, where a typical visitor through your back yard was a herd of elk or the visiting bald eagle. Out came Dan's cell phone as he shared his world of rivers, mountains, wildlife, and oh yeah, auctions. As this stranger became a friend, he said "you'll have to come visit us". Now understand, this was after sitting in a class together for 8 hours and having a meal together. The notion crossed my mind and was one I tucked away.
Dan went home to Helena and I back to the Ole North State. Days after being home, my iPhone received a notification. It was from Dan, showing amazing pictures of his daily jaunts from the Bitterroots to Great Falls. This continued for months. Feeling the pull of his pictures, I told Dan I was going to come to Montana and I asked for a hotel recommendation. He said "Hotel?", "Boy Howdy,
you're going to stay at the Pate Place!" I told him we couldn't do that, but he insisted. At the time, I had no idea that the Pate place was not only beautiful, but backed up to 300,000 undeveloped acres.
Packed with our cowboy boots and fly rods, Elizabeth and I made our connecting flight thru Salt Lake City and landed in Helena with Dan in the luggage area rolling out the Montana red carpet. The phone over the last 2 years had created a friendship we can only thank Steve Jobs for. And so began my 7 day passage into what I call my "Montana mind".
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| Our first afternoon in Montana |
I had no idea he was going to turn the keys over to Elizabeth and I, but he did. Essentially the place was ours. The first night, we were fed Montana grazed prime rib. Leah is not only an amazing person but an incredible culinary creationist. As the sunset that first day in Helena, a transformation was taking place in my mind. A transformation where there is no turning back. This place was imagined and handcrafted by God specifically for me (others too, I'm not greedy). We woke the following morning to the typically cool summer mornings. Looking out the backdoor, Liz said "lets take a walk". We stepped out at 4000 feet above sea level and began a few miles walk up the steep slope. Because of the elevation, we didn't speak much until we reached our decided summit. Walking over the aquifers of bedrock formations and shale rock, intentionally missing the small prickly pear bushes that spot the mountain side, we finally came to a resting place. We could barely see the ranch house we were staying at. We found a rock to rest, tried to catch our breath from the elevation difference of 700 feet back in NC. As corny as is sounds, the awe of the scenery captured me-took me and Montana became part of my emotional DNA.
My second happenstance friend came in thru the Helena yellow pages. Determined to catch trout and experience the life poetry that comes with rushing water being pressed against your thighs and calves, I found an outfitter and hired a guide. Wondering what to expect, what I wound up hiring became another Montana friend. I'm not sure of Taylor Todd's age, but I do know that he is from Northern
California, recently finished his Masters degree and is quite educated. Fleeing the concrete world, his full time job is guiding fishermen on the famed rivers of Montana. Taylor is a "riverman". (I'll make that word up). He taught us the unique methods of catching the rainbows and browns that live in the currents of rushing rivers once paddled by Lewis & Clark. Each year I travel to Montana, I don't hire guides to take me to the waters, I call my friend Taylor. As he lives his dream of communing with the waters daily, for 8 hours or so, he offers the cup of Montana water experience to the guests in his boat.
I probably sound like the Montana visitors center. I don't mean to. I have found my place of renewal. Since going, I have traveled all over the mid and south west corner of the state. My friendship that began in a Las Vegas Hotel has turned into a brotherhood of outdoors and auctioneers. Now, for three years I have been a guest auctioneer at the Last Chance 4-H Livestock sale. I'm really proud to be considered for that. Its almost as though I'm a surrogate Montanan. I like that!
Like the movies, I'm a broken person that seeks to stand at God's front porch in Montana trying to piece myself together. Where its beauty and the friendships I've made mesh, the stitches are tight. Now, I just long for the next time and until then, I can just see the sunset over the Elkhorns and hear the waters dancing over the rocks. The entire place proves a witness to an incredible Creator; one who longs for us to just see Him there.
