What Montana taught this Southern storyteller about shutting up

Every place has its own language. I don’t mean accents or vocabulary. I mean the unwritten rules that tell you how people see the world. I grew up in the South, where sarcasm is practically a sacrament and no good story should suffer from a shortage of embellishment.

Montana speaks differently.

Even the humor has a Montana accent: direct and to the point.

People here don’t waste words. They tell you what they know and leave the rest alone. We’ve been coming to this valley since the 1980s and have lived here full-time for more than seven years, long enough to know I’ll never stop learning Montana.

One of the first pieces of advice I received was, “Drive at the speed you’re comfortable slamming into the ditch at.” Direct and to the point, particularly in winter.

Our tiny town used to consist of a post office and a combination bar and restaurant. Then the bar burned down. That left the post office as our social center, where neighbors catch up on the news, solve the world’s problems, and occasionally create new ones.

On my way to Bozeman, I stopped in. After chatting with friends by the postal counter, I said, “I’d better get going. I need to pick up Gracie’s prescriptions.” Without missing a beat, our postmaster asked, “Would you mind picking up some Imodium for me?” The group chuckled as I said, “Sure.” Even the humor has a Montana accent: direct and to the point.

A few days later, Montana spoke again. Our cabin can be seen from the county road, nearly 10 miles from pavement. My father-in-law’s house lies above us, hidden among the pines. People don’t end up there by accident.

Our son Gray was cleaning his grandfather’s garage when an older pickup came winding through the trees. It stopped when the occupants spotted him. The older passenger leaned out the window. He was missing enough teeth that you noticed before he finished his first sentence.

“I’m looking for Don,” he said.

“There isn’t a Don here,” Gray replied.

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The man muttered that it had been a long time since he had been up this way and figured he had gotten turned around.

Then both men got out of the truck. The younger man was every bit of six-foot-four. Gray felt the hair rise on the back of his neck. His pistol was nearby. With bears and mountain lions plentiful around us, that was nothing unusual. But Gray never reached for it. He simply eased back a step and watched. The older man seemed perturbed. The younger man said nothing.

Without another word, they swapped places in the truck and eased back down the driveway toward the national forest. Gray immediately called and said, “Dad, I think they may have been casing the place.” I called the sheriff’s office to see if they had heard about these fellows. After dispatch took the message, I watched the truck come down from the forest and idle on the road in front of our cabin. Then it headed down the mountain. Soon afterward, the deputy called. I repeated the story.

The line went quiet. Finally, he said, “Well … we’ve got a fellow who goes around looking for Don …”

I waited. “But he’s usually over in the Pony area.” Pony sits on the other side of the mountain. Same county. Different side of the range.

Another pause. “I wonder if it could be the same guy.”

Every Southern instinct in me wanted to go full Bob Newhart. “Y-you … you think?”

Inwardly, my Southern commentary was still running. How many “looking for Don” fellows do you have around here? Is this some kind of franchise, and has this guy wandered out of his territory?

Instead, I held my tongue and answered in my best broken Montanan. “You know … it might be.”

The deputy happened to be driving up our road and offered to intercept them. Since they were already heading down the mountain, I declined. “We’ll handle it if they come back,” I said.

No lecture about escalation. No reminder to stay inside. No warning to leave everything to trained professionals.

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Just one word. “OK.” Direct and to the point.

After 35 years in Nashville, I never imagined telling a deputy, “We’ll handle it,” or hearing him agree. He assumed I could exercise good judgment. If I needed help, he’d come. Until then, he trusted me to handle my own place.

That economy of words defines the humor, the advice, and the lifestyle. As another election season pulls us into its riptide, we could use a little more of that.

I’ve watched people move here because they wanted to live in Montana, only to try to make it more like the place they left. I’ve found it’s better to let Montana change me. Out here, help isn’t just around the corner. You prepare, pay attention, fix what you can, and exercise good judgment because the nearest help may be 30 miles away. You also help your neighbor, especially if Imodium is involved.

And if those two fellows ever wander back up to our place? Well, after 35 years in Music City, I’ll know exactly what to tell them.

They’re looking for Don in all the wrong places.