Conversations

First, apologies for not posting yesterday. Internet connections are getting sparse as I head east. Even the libraries and McDonald's may or may not have connections for me when I need them. I'll try to post twice today.

Second, Gary points out that sage is not used for healing as I wrote a couple of days ago, it's for keeping evil spirits away. I guess it worked for me that way, too.

But about conversations: I like campgrounds because I get to talk to all kinds of people from all over. If I stayed in a motel, I might talk to the desk clerk and the rest of the time there would be television. Libraries and small restaurants are good for conversing, too.

Examples of recent conversations:

At the museum in Medora, I chatted with a fellow from Iowa who agreed with me that it was dismaying when things from our childhood are displayed in a museum. We particularly noticed the old telephones with the cranks on the sides. Then we began reminisce about party lines. We had eight customers on our country line. Each family had its own ring delivered by telephone operators. Ours was two rings, but the minute we picked up the call, we heard a click and knew that our neighbor, Mrs. Barclay, was listening in. I told the fellow that my father said that when the telephone made it to the farm it saved my grandmother's sanity during the long winter months when they didn't go anywhere. She had free entertainment when a call to anyone came through.

Then there was the woman at the campground from western New York State who said that everyone wished that New York City would form its own state, since all their taxes went there.

Many North Dakotans at the campground worried about the flooding. The State of North Dakota started the year with a balanced budget but this will cost millions. However, on the drive on Monday, I learned that the millions the state has made from oil revenues was put aside in a “rainy day” fund and should cover the costs. I don't like the “fracking” process of getting oil, but I suspect there are few in North Dakota that would agree with me this year.

At Beach, North Dakota, I chatted with two women who drive the lead cars for the big oversized loads of wind powered turbines being put up all over the United States. One of them had now been in everyone of the “lower 48” states, just having added Montana. The blades and parts on enormous trucks were parked all over the truck stop.

At Wibaux, Montana, I decided to stop for breakfast after an early morning start from Buffalo Gap in the rain. The only place open was the cafe at the Palace Hotel. I ordered a pancake, which turned out to be as big as a dinner plate. The cook came out with a batch of hot cinnamon rolls, each one four times as big as a Cinnabon. (I am not exaggerating.) Discretion won out there.

The waitress told me that she and her husband were ranchers who had been snowed in six times during their dreadful winter, but that they had just gotten their first computer. She went on Facebook right away. She said it saved her sanity, being able to connect with the outside world. I thought about my grandmother and her party line. Have things changed so much?

At Glendive, I ran into a pair of schoolteachers from British Columbia who told me what to expect as I headed west and I told them about the Palace Hotel sweet rolls and the Buffalo Gap campground.

I went on to the Glendive Library which is in a former bank which was round, for some reason.  It makes a perfect library with stacks with good sight lines so that the librarian at the desk can see everything that is going on.  At the back the bank officer's offices made perfect work spaces.

At Circle, I feasted at a salad bar at a cafe next to the grocery store and talked to the farmers. I mentioned that the winter wheat didn't look bad but they said that wasn't going to last because the wheat is still in mud and mildew has formed. The wheat will rot away. They had no plans to plant this summer. Look for higher food prices.

At the Circle library, Emmy told me that the cattle are getting fat on the grass but during the winter, the antelope and deer died of starvation. Even worse, the only place they could get away from the snow was on the railroad tracks. There would be herds of deer sheltering there when a freight train came through. As many as twenty at a time were slaughtered. The government usually required a report for each deer killed but this year, they said, don't bother.

The turkey vultures circled over the land as I drove. They must have been in vulture heaven when they migrated from the south and found so many deer carcasses emerging from the snow.

I headed south with the plan of staying at a national forest near Ashland, but at a Miles City restaurant, a family that lived that way told me my car would be traveling over rain damaged roads with deep, deep potholes. They steered me to Broaddus and the RV park, where I was assigned a tent spot next to the corral. The horses came over to watch me put up the tent and a friendly cat decided I was wonderful. She tried to climb into the car then the tent. I didn't think my Rascal would approve and shooed her away.

And that ended Monday.