One of the things I was looking forward to on this road trip was meeting people from all backgrounds. Initially, I had the idea that I wanted to have conversations with people and listen carefully. After all, we live in a contentious political time and I was desperate to renew my faith in humanity. I’d come to develop a negative mindset about our country and I wanted to challenge that. If I could meet people in their own space, maybe I would understand a bit about their lives and as a result, a bit about how we got to this messed up place.
One thing I immediately intuited was that, for the most part, American’s do not want to engage about politics, at least the subset of folks I am meeting on the road. I found this out through Mark’s occasional blunt comments regarding our current administration. Interestingly, those comments were met with silence, a nod, or a change of subject. It seemed there was no desire to talk about the debacle we find ourselves in. (One big exception was Europeans, they have plenty to say but want to know how the heck we feel.) Rather, people wanted to talk about books, food, kids, jobs, travels, weather, the Cricket, the wildfires, the road. Which was fine with me. Most times, I was able to get a lead on where someone’s politics lay, and it was fascinating to listen and hear what their particular concerns and troubles were.
We have had at least 100 conversations in campgrounds, on hiking trails, in diners, and rest stops. The Cricket is a magnet. Old-time RVer’s are confounded by its odd shape. They are uncertain whether they like it or not and are not shy about it. When they find it has no toilet, the response is usually “ the wife would not stand for that”. Yes, it’s mostly the men who come by to kibitz about the trailer. I’ve come to love these conversations. I imagine it’s a lot like a gaggle of farmers standing outside the general store shooting the breeze. It happens like clockwork in every campground we arrive at. The Cricket is our icebreaker; a peek inside and around and we are onto other subjects, the door is open.
Some of our conversations have evolved in to more memorable connections. We stumbled upon Dano O’Keefe at the Bar N Ranch in West Yellowstone. The weather was turning cool and snowy and after checking into the KOA, I noted that Bar N Ranch was the driveway right next door. I had read in my guidebook that there was a great place to eat there and it was too cold to cook. We drove up the long dusty road to a building that looked like a restaurant but seemed desolate. There was an open sign in the window so we ventured in. The interior was completely unexpected. Lavish western, full size taxidermied mountain goats, bears, beavers, an enclosed wine cellar and prairie views out the huge windows. More importantly, a long empty bar and the smell of good food waited. Dano emerged from the kitchen and asked what’ll we have. Let me just say, Dano makes a mean Old Fashioned, not a new, stylized version of an OF but a true blue, burn the back of the throat Old Fashioned. Dano hails from Dallas and was up here working for the summer season, His time was winding down and after we ordered we engaged in some great back and forth. Dano was opinionated and had worked in the industry for a while. Over some damn good Trout Piccata and Elk Stroganoff we indulged in topics as varied as sports, wine, tourists, and his take on Glamping. It’s that time of year when service industry people are ready to carve out a little time for themselves and not have to plaster a smile on their face every day. Dano was imagining the places he would visit, a time when he could recharge and plan what’s next.
To escape the snow and cold, we checked into the Lake Lodge in Yellowstone for an evening. There, in the lobby facing the wind swept Yellowstone Lake, we were sipping some white wine and two couples joined us. We struck up a conversation and found no shortage of things to talk about. Beth and Mary Alice are sisters and live on opposite coasts with their spouses, Jeff and Tim. Mary Alice was a great raconteur, turns out she had worked in a local bookstore and had some favorite authors to share. She also rode horses, and frequently fell off horses. We hadn’t made plans for dinner and Tim generously offered to change their reservation to 6 and we ended up laughing, sharing family histories and tragedies and travel stories late in to the night. They were good people and I’m better for sharing an evening with them. I must admit my head hurt the next morning.
The cold front worsened in Yellowstone with the passes shutting down and stranding everyone. We had shivered in our trailer for a few nights under 5 blankets and several layers of clothing and ended up having to spend much of our time in Gardiner, not my favorite place. A year round gateway town to Yellowstone, it was not a great place to find a cozy spot to park oneself to read and write. The local library consisted of two tiny rooms and the coffee shop was blasting loud music. Even the restaurants were more like bars. I was eating my fill of Elk burgers and bison meatloaf.
It was with unmitigated joy that we found Chico Hot Springs, a circa 1900 lodge that was a literal oasis of warmth and western hospitality. We rented a cabin for two nights and while the wind blew to 40mph and the sky darkened with clouds, the Absaroka Mountains were hidden from view and the rain came followed by thick snowflakes. We would write all morning and Mark would study, then we would grab our bathing suits and join all the locals and travelers down in the hot springs, piped into a pool area within the resort. The best part was the adjacent saloon, with a walk up window at the pool area where you could grab a cold one and plunge back into the steaming waters. There was a fine restaurant on the premises also where trout and elk ravioli were specialties. It was a wonderful respite from the weather.
We met so many friendly people here, the barkeep, the lady at the bar from Red Lodge, the couple from Philly in the hot tub (high five!), a ceramic artist from Montana named Lisa Lord, who summed up her move to Montana in one word: Freedom. The most memorable character we met though at Chico was at the bar inside the nice restaurant. We decided to eat at the bar the second night, the food was so good the first and we had no reservation for the second. Of course, you always meet the most interesting people sitting at the bar. Within 5 minutes of sitting down, we became fast friends with Toby. Honestly, it felt like Mark found his long lost brother. And yes, the door opened with politics. Toby, a Jewish museum curator from Nebraska, was sarcastic, acerbic, well read, an outdoorsmen and had an opinion on everything. We were thrilled to meet him, we laughed, bought each other drinks and reveled in the pleasure that good conversation brings.
We have been traveling for a month now. I’ve taken to keeping a notebook to record all the people we meet. There is something in these moments of connection that give me hope and help me to see a person in all their fine detail. The divisive state of our world had captured me. I was hostage to the black and white, to the labels and the assumptions. I’m not saying that since I’ve been on the road, a few words of fellowship hoodwink me into thinking everyone is a Pollyanna or has the earth’s best interests at heart or respects women enough to not vote for a misogynist. These conversations enable me to see beyond the veneer, I hear story and see commonalities. I witness humanity and that’s enough to give me some semblance of hope. I do know this; that’s where healing and understanding will happen, in the small moments, in the listening.
Last night, we had two older gentlemen visit us in campsite. The first, a retired dentist in his eighties, sat down and told us his history of camping, all the places he’d been, how he started out in an old beat up tin can in his youth. He spoke hesitatingly and paused often, to grasp the memories. We sat and waited and listened. There was nowhere we had to be. Ten minutes after he left, a man with a shock of gray hair, multiple piercings in both ears, wrists bedecked with gold and silver bands stopped by. He was a retired academic living in Northern California. He liked the Cricket. And the stories flowed.