“You may be the most cynical, born and bred, citified lefty like me — instinctively skeptical of big concepts like “patriotism,” relatively foreign to hunting culture, unused to wide open spaces.
But spend any length of time traveling around Montana, and you will understand what all that “purple mountain majesties” is all about.
You’ll soon be wrapping yourself in the flag and yelling, “America, **** yeah!” with an absolute and nonironic sincerity that will take you by surprise.
You will understand why and what people fought and died for — or at least perceived themselves to be fighting and dying for — either defending Native American hunting grounds against Custer or “defending America” against foreign aggressors. And you will be stunned, stunned and silenced by the breathtaking, magnificent beauty of Montana’s wide open spaces.”
– Anthony Bourdain…
I already deeply miss his unique, intimate, raw, and endearing look at the world.
“And when you look up at the night sky over Montana, it’s hard not to think that we can’t be alone on this rock, that there isn’t something else out there or up there in charge of this crazy-ass enterprise.”
-Anthony Bourdain
Here’s some big Montana night sky for you Anthony, wish you could have come our way again..
Creating a bridge between the landscape and the humans who inhabit the land, barns provide a place of sanctuary and shelter, where hay is stored, cows are milked, and little furry babies are born. The photos are of Montana barns with one exception. The first photo below is from the West Virginia land where my Dad was born, and where my Grandparents farmed and made their life. My Dad grew up on this land. I remember my Grandfather there in that barn, milking the cows and giving squirts of that fresh milk to the kittens that gathered. There were horses in the field, chickens roaming, a big garden, wheat, pigs in the pen. My Grandfather built this barn and it was a work of structural genius.
From a frosted October sunrise, this is Grandpa’s barn.
“Where you’re sure to live twice as long, and see twice as many things, and be two times as happy at the end. Where snow is more wonderful than rain, than anything.”
