Studying the Base.
So,
I spent the weekend in Republican country this weekend: “Montana.” This would be an area Bush would call his “base.” It’s a dangerous place to be of the base. Being an out and proud registered Democrat in Montana is akin to being a member of the KKK in Berkeley. Probably nobody will kill you, but you may find it difficult to buy basic essentials like transportation and food from local merchants. (Though in Berkeley if you were a KKK member, we’d protest against you, boycott your economic base, destroy your following, and then put you on public assistance in rent controlled housing in the name of preserving diversity.)
But back to understanding Montana.
When George Bush made a victory trip to Montana after the 2000 election on Air Force One, he gave a free trip to the Congressional Delegation (the Republicans) minus the one who was a Democrat (Max Baucus). --He flew commercial. There was a certain amount of attention paid to this act by the local Montana newspapers, but it didn’t really diminish Bush’s popularity in that very rural state. In Montana there are very few really important things above and beyond, (this is if you are male btw) hunting, fishing and generally killing things. The NRA is big here. Well actually, guns are big here. So are trucks. But that has more to do with dirt roads and bad weather than anything about machismo. Also, its hard to get out to the boonies in a Audi to shoot things. So it’s a very practical state. If a man has a gun, a truck, and a woman to cook whatever he shoots, he is pretty much set. This may all sound a little non-progressive, but if you go to a bar in on of the many small towns in Montana you are more likely to hear George Thurgood than Madonna or Cher. Forget techno. Not that this bothers me much. I could forget techno.
I bring this all up, because I found myself in a couple bars, in a rural town in Montana last Saturday night. Now, I’m not going to tell you how limited I found rural values, I’m not going to tell you inappropriate I found a few of the jokes told to me. Nor am I going to tell you those jokes. No, I’m going to tell you how I, an occasionally organic vegetable eatin, intellectual poet, who knows way too many of the people, (and regularly invites them to my house) that the bar jokes were about, passed off as an okay guy.
Now, I didn’t really have plans for Saturday night, and my brother asked me if I wanted to go out on the town. (Mind you this town has less people in it than my boss has working for him, and I have more people working for me than the local town high school graduates every year.) So, it’s a little small. If you walk into a bar in a town that small people pay attention to you. After all they’ve been looking at the same faces since they were born. There are the normal questions: “Hey, who are you?” etc. In my case, people tend to note that I’m big. I was the tallest guy in the bar, and there was no “dirth of girth” as one of my Berkeley beer drinking friends puts it. –Or as a local cowboy put it, “You cast a big shadow my man.” I perked my eyebrow at him, and he quickly added. “In a good way, I mean.” I just chuckled and asked him if he wanted a beer. One dollar later, and a draft beer, he decided I was probably okay.
I suppose I should fill you in on the scene a little more. I was actually in two bars, “The Grand” and “The Keg.” I know these aren’t really well thought out names, but with bars outside of England, bar names tend to lack flare, (there are no “Speckled Hedgehogs.”) unless they are gay, and even then Montanan’s aren’t big on names. I mean a quick check of the web, shows the local gay bar in Montana is called: “The Loft.” –Somehow, I just know its in a basement. No, they are big on “The” name in Montana But we are talking about a state that is into basics. Towns in Montana tend to have two types of names. They are named after the white man that first stole the land from the local natives or they are a description of the landscape or local activity. So you get something like: Shepard, Klein, Roundup, or Coal Strip. (I guess thief’s lack imagination.)
So, back to the bar scene.
I was not wearing dusters, cowboy hats, or a baseball cap advertising a feed or tractor company. So I stood out. There were three women in the bars. (Not counting bartenders.) My brother’s wife. A wife of a guy I’m about to discuss, and a woman whose origin and relation I never identified. Beer was a dollar a glass, so origins of the locals are a little sketchy in my mind at this point. After about five of these dollar beers, the guy I’m about to talk about, got curious. I had been sitting with him for about fifteen minutes, and it occurred to the guy I'm about to talk about that he knew, my brother, his wife, my brothers friend, but didn’t know who I was. He, the guy I’m talking about, asked. (I might mention at this point, that I had been avoiding conversation with this guy I’m talking about, as he tended to use the “N” word in about every third sentence. He, the guy I’m talking about, asked me who I was. My brother said, I was his brother.
“Oh,” he said, (note he didn’t really know my brother), “Where are you from?”
There was a period of silence. (About fifteen seconds) before I said meekly, “California.”
The guy I’m talking about said , “CALIFORNIA! Christ.”
I gave him a dirty look. He, the guy I’m talking about, stared me in the face and asked me the toughest question he could think of for a guy that wouldn’t use the “N” word in any conversation. “You ever eat elk?”
I said, “Sure.” (The truth, my father assonates hoofed animals for sport.)
He sneered a little, “You ever eat deer liver?”
I said, “Sure.” (The truth, my father assonates hoofed animals for sport.) I had him stumped.
“You ever eat antelope?”
(I lied). “They don’t have much meat on them.” I responded. (I know this because, the truth is, my father assonates hoofed animals for sport.)
“Well, you fish don’t you?” he asked.
I had, so I said, “Of course.”
He said, “What you drinkin?”
He, the guy I’m talking about, bought me a beer, used the “N” word a few more times and asked me my name repeatedly. He couldn’t remember it, so he named me “Francisco” and told everyone for the rest of the night that was my name, cause, Montanan’s remember descriptions I guess. (Coal Strip is a name of a town.)
As he used the “N” word throughout the evening, I thought of a few questions for him?
“Had he ever herded, culled and assonated his own organic carrots?”
“Had he ever eaten the grilled freshly murdered heart of an artichoke?”
But I didn’t ask those questions, and that’s how I not only passed as a Republican from Montana, but got free beer from some Republicans and they guy I’m talking about.
Later this week, I'll tell you about the big hay stack sculpture fest I went to early on Saturday.
I spent the weekend in Republican country this weekend: “Montana.” This would be an area Bush would call his “base.” It’s a dangerous place to be of the base. Being an out and proud registered Democrat in Montana is akin to being a member of the KKK in Berkeley. Probably nobody will kill you, but you may find it difficult to buy basic essentials like transportation and food from local merchants. (Though in Berkeley if you were a KKK member, we’d protest against you, boycott your economic base, destroy your following, and then put you on public assistance in rent controlled housing in the name of preserving diversity.)
But back to understanding Montana.
When George Bush made a victory trip to Montana after the 2000 election on Air Force One, he gave a free trip to the Congressional Delegation (the Republicans) minus the one who was a Democrat (Max Baucus). --He flew commercial. There was a certain amount of attention paid to this act by the local Montana newspapers, but it didn’t really diminish Bush’s popularity in that very rural state. In Montana there are very few really important things above and beyond, (this is if you are male btw) hunting, fishing and generally killing things. The NRA is big here. Well actually, guns are big here. So are trucks. But that has more to do with dirt roads and bad weather than anything about machismo. Also, its hard to get out to the boonies in a Audi to shoot things. So it’s a very practical state. If a man has a gun, a truck, and a woman to cook whatever he shoots, he is pretty much set. This may all sound a little non-progressive, but if you go to a bar in on of the many small towns in Montana you are more likely to hear George Thurgood than Madonna or Cher. Forget techno. Not that this bothers me much. I could forget techno.
I bring this all up, because I found myself in a couple bars, in a rural town in Montana last Saturday night. Now, I’m not going to tell you how limited I found rural values, I’m not going to tell you inappropriate I found a few of the jokes told to me. Nor am I going to tell you those jokes. No, I’m going to tell you how I, an occasionally organic vegetable eatin, intellectual poet, who knows way too many of the people, (and regularly invites them to my house) that the bar jokes were about, passed off as an okay guy.
Now, I didn’t really have plans for Saturday night, and my brother asked me if I wanted to go out on the town. (Mind you this town has less people in it than my boss has working for him, and I have more people working for me than the local town high school graduates every year.) So, it’s a little small. If you walk into a bar in a town that small people pay attention to you. After all they’ve been looking at the same faces since they were born. There are the normal questions: “Hey, who are you?” etc. In my case, people tend to note that I’m big. I was the tallest guy in the bar, and there was no “dirth of girth” as one of my Berkeley beer drinking friends puts it. –Or as a local cowboy put it, “You cast a big shadow my man.” I perked my eyebrow at him, and he quickly added. “In a good way, I mean.” I just chuckled and asked him if he wanted a beer. One dollar later, and a draft beer, he decided I was probably okay.
I suppose I should fill you in on the scene a little more. I was actually in two bars, “The Grand” and “The Keg.” I know these aren’t really well thought out names, but with bars outside of England, bar names tend to lack flare, (there are no “Speckled Hedgehogs.”) unless they are gay, and even then Montanan’s aren’t big on names. I mean a quick check of the web, shows the local gay bar in Montana is called: “The Loft.” –Somehow, I just know its in a basement. No, they are big on “The” name in Montana But we are talking about a state that is into basics. Towns in Montana tend to have two types of names. They are named after the white man that first stole the land from the local natives or they are a description of the landscape or local activity. So you get something like: Shepard, Klein, Roundup, or Coal Strip. (I guess thief’s lack imagination.)
So, back to the bar scene.
I was not wearing dusters, cowboy hats, or a baseball cap advertising a feed or tractor company. So I stood out. There were three women in the bars. (Not counting bartenders.) My brother’s wife. A wife of a guy I’m about to discuss, and a woman whose origin and relation I never identified. Beer was a dollar a glass, so origins of the locals are a little sketchy in my mind at this point. After about five of these dollar beers, the guy I’m about to talk about, got curious. I had been sitting with him for about fifteen minutes, and it occurred to the guy I'm about to talk about that he knew, my brother, his wife, my brothers friend, but didn’t know who I was. He, the guy I’m talking about, asked. (I might mention at this point, that I had been avoiding conversation with this guy I’m talking about, as he tended to use the “N” word in about every third sentence. He, the guy I’m talking about, asked me who I was. My brother said, I was his brother.
“Oh,” he said, (note he didn’t really know my brother), “Where are you from?”
There was a period of silence. (About fifteen seconds) before I said meekly, “California.”
The guy I’m talking about said , “CALIFORNIA! Christ.”
I gave him a dirty look. He, the guy I’m talking about, stared me in the face and asked me the toughest question he could think of for a guy that wouldn’t use the “N” word in any conversation. “You ever eat elk?”
I said, “Sure.” (The truth, my father assonates hoofed animals for sport.)
He sneered a little, “You ever eat deer liver?”
I said, “Sure.” (The truth, my father assonates hoofed animals for sport.) I had him stumped.
“You ever eat antelope?”
(I lied). “They don’t have much meat on them.” I responded. (I know this because, the truth is, my father assonates hoofed animals for sport.)
“Well, you fish don’t you?” he asked.
I had, so I said, “Of course.”
He said, “What you drinkin?”
He, the guy I’m talking about, bought me a beer, used the “N” word a few more times and asked me my name repeatedly. He couldn’t remember it, so he named me “Francisco” and told everyone for the rest of the night that was my name, cause, Montanan’s remember descriptions I guess. (Coal Strip is a name of a town.)
As he used the “N” word throughout the evening, I thought of a few questions for him?
“Had he ever herded, culled and assonated his own organic carrots?”
“Had he ever eaten the grilled freshly murdered heart of an artichoke?”
But I didn’t ask those questions, and that’s how I not only passed as a Republican from Montana, but got free beer from some Republicans and they guy I’m talking about.
Later this week, I'll tell you about the big hay stack sculpture fest I went to early on Saturday.
posted by Stan at 10:58 PM
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