Is It Over Or Just Beginning?
This is Jon Tester, who was named the winner of Montana’s U.S. Senate race yesterday after a close vote. Tester was in a hotly contested race with U.S. Rep Denny Rehberg (R-Mont.), with both candidates drawing much attention and funding from their national parties. Going into Tuesday, this race was considered key in determining which party had the majority in the U.S. Senate next term.
For those of you outside of Montana, the race was pretty ugly as you might imagine, both campaigns saying some insulting things about the other. That’s hard to listen to.
But Tester won. Now he and all elected officials, of all persuasions and backgrounds, have to find a way to work together.
I wonder what it’s like to so publicly say things and have things said on your behalf that are so mean-spirited and then to have to go meet those people and their supporters in person and work together.
Cancer Support Community Project
I’m extremely proud to have worked with some great people at the Cancer Support Community here in Bozeman on their recent advertising campaign. I met some wonderful people, including Jane here, who is a cancer survivor.
Thanks Michelle Aranda, Janette May and Becky Franks, among many others. More to come….
Where I Live
I was happy to get an assignment recently for Montana magazine to supply pictures to accompany Al Kesselheim‘s essay about Bozeman, where we both live. It was fun to go through my files and get out and finally make some of the pictures I have had on my list of Things To Do for way too long.
This is Soby’s Cafe owner Donna Grinwis, 38, who started as a waitress at Soby’s in May 1994, then bought the place in 2008 b/c the owners would have closed otherwise. “I love the place and the customers. It’s like going to work and seeing your friends everyday,” she says. “There’s a reason we live here. It’s not to make a lot of money.”
And fortunately, a lot of life in Bozeman happens outside:
Garbage Safety
Meet Shawn Stewart, Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks biologist, who was instrumental in changing the trash bins used by the town of Red Lodge to bear-safe models. I photographed him recently on assignment for Montana Outdoors magazine.
Mr. Stewart lives in Red Lodge, at the confluence of two forks of Rock Creek. “It’s just a funnel for bears,” he says. And between 1988 and 2008, Mr. Stewart estimates 10 or more bears were going through the garbage bins of Red Lodge every night.
“We had bears so conditioned to living in Red Lodge, they were coming out of hibernation early and coming into town,” he says. It was messy, sure, but bears — even the black bears that were patrolling Red Lodge — are dangerous and nobody wants their kids waiting for a school bus while Ursus americanus is roaming the streets.
So Mr. Stewart worked with warden Kevin Nichols, and Red Lodge citizens and the city council to implement the use of bear-proof trash bins in Red Lodge and in 2008, 1,100 bear-proof bins were in use. Now, the bear problem is gone.
“I’m really very proud of this,” Mr. Stewart says. And he should be. He and Mr. Nichols were awarded the FWP Innovative Thinker Award in 2009.
Carnivores
A pair of water bugs feast on the carcass of a grasshopper in a small creek in the Bridger Mountains north of Bozeman. My research tells me water bugs feed on land-based insects that happen to fall into the water.
I had no idea these little bugs were flesh eaters. The grasshopper, by the way, eats leaves. I guess it’s kind of like huge bison, who eat plants, being devoured by smaller wolves.
The Running Journey
Our daughter, Katie, has fortunately fallen in with a great group of kids. We were nervous thinking about her making the transition from the class of 14 she graduated the eighth grade with to her record class of 537 as she enters high school. But it has gone — so far, at least — exceptionally well.
And one of the things I credit most with this smooth transition is Katie’s decision to join the high school cross country team. The team met throughout the summer so she got to meet lots of new people easily, outside of the stresses that come along with school. And on top of that, it’s a fantastic group of people. Although the team is going for its sixth consecutive state title, they are welcoming and supportive to those who can barely run a mile without stopping.
Last weekend, we went to a race at a local ski area and I was impressed with the effort all of the kids put forth — from the fastest to the slowest. I think that speaks volumes about who they are and who they will become.
The Electric City
Great Falls, Mont., is named for the five waterfalls on the Missouri River that took Lewis and Clark 31 days to portage around on their way west in 1805. Each of those falls now has a hydroelectric dam and Great Falls’ nickname is thus the Electric City.
I had a speaking engagement recently in Great Falls, which ended just after sunset so I hustled down to the river and found this bridge over the Missouri at Ninth Street North. The following morning, I had to leave early to get to an assignment in Helena, but couldn’t resist stopping to photograph some early-morning fog along the way.
Ruby
Meet Ruby Zitzer, who at 17, has had more adventures than many adults I know. She has paddled remote waterways for weeks at a time all over North America, spent an extended stretch in Africa and in her spare time, is an All-American Nordic skier. Some of her adventures are chronicled in Let Them Paddle: Coming of Age on the Water, written by her father and my friend, Al Kesselheim. It’s a great read.
After Ruby graduates high school in the spring, she’s planning a return to one of the rivers in the book, the Kazan in the northern Canadian province of Nunavut. The last time she was on the Kazan, Ruby was 10, paddling for 40 days with her family, virtually alone in the wilderness. Now she’s talking about leading a trip with a few close friends.
Madison Junction
Living just 90 miles away, we get to Yellowstone fairly often. It’s a privilege to live so close to such a wonder. And when I go to Yellowstone, I usually want to cover a lot of ground because there is so much to see.
But last visit, we just got about 15 miles into the park and stopped at Madison Junction, where the Firehole River joins the Gibbon River to form the Madison, to watch the day’s last few hours. It was the most peaceful visit to Yellowstone we can remember.
Getting Along
I like Republicans. My parents are Republicans. I’m pretty sure a lot of my friends are Republicans.
I’ve been a Democrat since 1984. And every election season the rhetoric amps up to such a state that each side seems to think the other is the personification of evil. That bothers me.
Last Thursday, I gave my Be Who You Is talk to a great crowd in Great Falls, complaining, “Our society today is so divided. We are so insulated from differing points of view that we no longer have to listen to one another….” And I got a call from a Washington, D.C., marketing agency asking me to cover some events for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce the next day. The events were endorsements of Republican Senate candidate Denny Rehberg by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
Let’s be clear: I have no plans to vote for Mr. Rehberg. In fact, I have a campaign sign for his opponent, Jon Tester, in my front yard as I write.
But this was my chance to demonstrate a willingness to work with and listen to those to which I am politically opposed.
So I’m glad I did the assignments. Rob Engstrom (that’s him in the middle, with Congressman Rehberg on the right) and other U.S. Chamber speakers talked about endorsing candidates regardless of party, and afterward agreed with me about the large problem divisiveness is currently. One guy even said he liked Jon Tester personally, he just wasn’t planning on voting for him.
I was glad to hear that. In short, I feel I made some friends from the other side. And that felt good. It gave me hope.
Thomas Lee True West 