It starts with angry anxiety, as usual, when stakes are high and the body doesn’t cooperate. Everything leading up to this trip has been of ill omens: A weather forecast that calls for rain and cold weather every day we’re up in Montana during a lovely June, not enough eggs to really cook for everyone, losing a chicken before hand, and a gout flareup the night before we need to leave. With all the weariness already starting and we’re still just in Utah, Taylor and I knew we’d be in for a big trip, but she really couldn’t have imagined just how big it’d end up being.
We meet her old man up in Tremonton around 10, with plans to head out immediately after, when he drops the unfortunate news on us that he’s just broken out the back window of his truck as well as needing repairs to the massive toy-hauler trailer he’s just picked up. We spend another 5 hours at the dealership, with an 8 hour drive ahead of us starting up at 4pm, but we’re filled up from lunch at the diner down the street and eager to begin the drive across state lines.
Burning up the interstate through Idaho and beyond brings gorgeous views of countryside, mountain scapes, lakes, rivers and streams. Everything I love condensed in a seemingly endless landscape of rolling hills that collide with spired peaks, farmsteads hidden in the grass and trees along the route through Montana to Butte, where we watch the sunset and an encounter of a creep in his 40s with a group of highschoolers ready to throw hands in the truck stop McDonalds. “Par for the course now”, I think to myself, shaking out the stinging pain in my foot, hobbling out to the truck and swallowing 1600mg of a painkiller cocktail. By the time we get to the next truck stop in Missoula, I’m burned out, mildly hallucinating, and ready to pass the fuck out on the pull-out sofa in the hot trailer that’s been hastily set up on a nice little hill. The angle sets the interior up to lean like a ship stuck in pack ice, and even I feel a little adrift in this space, floating off into a dreary haze of slumber that fades to black before I can-.
Waking up in the morning I’m feeling a bit better in the foot, but it’s still a pain to move around. That doesn’t matter to me though, because my girlfriend and I can get a little peace from the struggle of driving or staying awake by taking a walk around downtown Missoula; First picking up some coffee and breakfast bagels from the little café, Morning Birds Bakery, where we indulge ourselves on one of the best god damn everything bagels I’ve ever had, with eggs and bacon to boot. So impressed by the baked goods we decide to grab a loaf of their sourdough as well, and I wonder to myself why and how everything seems so much better here in Montana than it does back in Utah. Every time I’ve been here, I’m blown away by how much better every aspect of the place really is. There’s even more to come, as lunch begins to loom not long after the bagels, and we’ve got a host of groceries yet to buy for the 4 days ahead. A few more heartaches ensue, namely, colder winds and the discovery of all our eggs broken in the truck drawer, contents strewn exclusively on the fishing pack I plan to use in bear country.
Once that’s all finished, I bring my guests to the number one barbecue joint that’s ever graced my short, naieve life, and that’s Notorious P.I.G. on Main Street Missoula. There’s no good words to describe the absolute phenomenon that is the Piggie Smalls, only biblical references of heaven, paradise, and the ecstasy of learning new love, but instead of a fallout you just get to take another bite. Once we’re filled to the brim from the platter of just about everything you can order, we start up again for Kalispell, where Taylor and I are set to pick up her younger sister Jackie who will be joining us on the trip.
Liquor stores, head shops and cigars all ready, we set out again when I get a call from an unknown number and take it on the truck speaker. It’s a voice we all recognize and the girl’s father, in disappointed tone, shouts to us “I won’t fit, I’m too big” into the campsite I’d reserved back in December. He’s got a KOA site picked out for himself, and I’m starting to suspect he might’ve had this planned from the get, but it’s not going to change where I hitch up for the trip on the Hungry Horse Reservoir.
From here it’s mostly smooth sailing: We pitch the truck tent up at our campsite, no neighbors in town due to the miserable conditions, and we can drive the sporty Polaris side by side to and from the KOA to the Reservoir camp to keep things to an amicable level of parental advisory versus late night laughter. The hammock is pitched, the tarp set up, and the campsites are really starting to come together while we enjoy ourselves and try to make the best of the weather. A few breaks in the clouds here and there allow us the joy of polar plunging into the cool water, attempts at fishing proving fruitless with a family of unfortunately impatient persons, but at the end of the day, things are all going well.
It's the third of four days staying in the area when we head up to Kintla Lake in Glacier, and the plans all start to come together. Everyone is in good spirits after the long dirt road drive, the sun is just starting to pop out for a moment, and the glacial lake is glittering when I pop down on a knee and make that girlfriend into a Fiancé. “Yes” is the word in this most beautiful of places, where even the rainy days are better. Montana itself feels like an allegory to the woman I’m with, whose ability to turn my mood at the drop of a hat has been a gift I never realized I needed so much in life. Just like the rest of this place, I feel robbed of words or an inability to describe the emotions I feel in the moment and sharing them with a blog post on a website nobody will read seems like the most I’d be able to articulate to anyone else that isn’t the woman I love. I begin to realize some things in life aren’t for sharing with others, aren’t for showing online, and are best left wordless and remembered in the heart rather than the mind.
That said, I certainly don’t mind sharing the experience of what we shared as our first meal together as an engaged couple: A burger, a sandwich, each served with. wine and beer from the Northern Lights Saloon in Polebridge.
Our last day is exploring another end of the park, past Lake McDonald where we end up enjoying a few falls and nearly tumbling into the rushing river before me, which would have made a very interesting engagement story, but instead I’m able to (very fashionably) bring myself to a smooth stop just feet before the waters would have taken me. I ponder momentarily if I’d have even cared about the wet dip if I didn’t have my camera strapped around me, then proceed back to the shoreline and off the slick rock I’d slid down.
Finally, on the way home, we stop by the P.I.G. once more as I nurse a miserable hangover away from my soul, and we drop off Jackie at the airport again. Not far from Butte we stop by a water access, and I get what I really came for: Silence, fishing on Montana waters in beautifully warm weather in the middle of the most lovely valley I’ve ever fished. I don’t take much out of the water, but I do catch what I came for: A native Westslope Cutthroat, and a small brown trout. It feels like just as we arrive, we need to head on again, and we burn down the road once more, deep into the night and finally arriving at our home near midnight. All’s well on the homestead, except the tomato and pepper plants that seem to all have died over the heavy water week. But none of that matters anymore, because now I’m an engaged man, and life finally seems to be in a state of balance, where the love is real and joy is daily. Thank you Taylor: I love you.
