I was having a hard time breathing in the thin mountain air. It started in Denver and I forgot to mention it because my brain was leaking. People and thoughts swirled around, popping in and out, memories lost in the clutter, like the time I threw a party with Laramie and a guy who was a friend of a friend showed up, and as he walked over I asked our friend Diane, “What’s his name again?” Before she could answer, he walked up to shake my hand and thank me for inviting him, and for hosting, and he says “The guacamole is awesome, what’s in it, sour cream?” And I’m thinking, no, there’s no fucking sour cream in my guacamole, and his name isn’t Kevin or Ken or Dennis, but it doesn’t matter, I wasn’t going to have the answer in the moment, so I dipped a chip into it, chewing, savoring, buying time for me or Diane to remember the guy’s name, only neither of us of did, so I just said, “I don’t know. I didn’t make it, but it’s tasty, right?” 

There was a moment where I could have asked him how things were going or I could work the crowd and see how everyone was doing, a not uncommon move by the host of a gathering. Perhaps dismissive, but there are social cues and if he didn’t understand them, then so be it. 

“Thanks for coming! I appreciate it. Do you know Diane? I’m going to make sure Fred’s not burning our food on the grill. Eat, please. Tons of food.” 

I walked away thinking why am I so awkward? Why am I such a dick? How do I even have one person here, let alone twenty? And did you know fifty percent of people don’t have an internal monologue? There’s just nothing. I don’t know if it’s silence, but it’s not this, what’s happening while I walk to check on Fred at the grill because the windows are open on this warm spring day, and the guy with the forgotten name might be watching, and I have to play the part. What’s a life like where you don’t have to play the part? 

That’s what I remembered when I couldn’t sleep at 3:00 A.M. in my hotel outside of Three Forks, sitting up in bed, my lungs struggling, my skin on edge, my right leg restless, my foot bouncing while I scrolled through recent pictures on my phone. 

A photo of me standing at an I-25 N sign. The rain had stopped and a man in a red bucket hat with a camera around his neck took my photo. I pointed at the sign and made an open mouthed face as if the sign was going to what? Eat me? Was I surprised that I’d made it that far? At least the swelling and bruising had lessened around my eye. I’d planned a haircut before Meredith told me about the thrift shops and the trip. That didn’t happen, and now it inched to my shoulders and was close to Dad’s early Spin Cycle vibe. “You look just like your father!” How many times had I heard that?

Cracked green mountains in Sheridan, Wyoming, like the mossy teeth of an old mountain troll.

A town of prairie dogs poking up from burrows along the freeway. I’d always seen them as nature’s living cartoons. That Pixar hadn’t made a movie about a coterie of prairie dogs yet was a goddamn shame. 

(Time for honesty. You’re getting the full-fledged, unabridged Fender Carradine on his quest to take the ring to Mordor. But you’re also getting light on sleep, maybe concussed, definitely can’t breathe, Fender, who doesn’t know what a group of prairie dogs is called (a town), or a family (a coterie). Had to look it up. Thanks. Had to get that off my chest and out of my brain.)

The olive hills of Bozeman Pass with the tracks of the transcontinental railroad downslope and heading into tunnels carved through the land. Did you know that the Northern Pacific Railway built it as part of a section that ran from Saint Paul, Minnesota to Tacoma, Washington? Neither did I. 

Most of Spin Cycle’s travel was at night between gigs, Karl doing the heavy work while everyone slept. Some trips were during the day, and we stopped to take photos, look at monuments, and feel sunshine on our skin. One of those pit stops was at Bozeman Pass. And I should’ve known, it should’ve clicked, why this trip, why this route. And my breathing slowed and evened. 

I set my phone on the bed. It was opened to a photo of the clay-colored historical marker at Bozeman Pass. I took Heather’s stack of photos out of the bag and flipped through them. Half-way through I found it. The same photo, or close to it. She’d gotten a clearer image of the words carved into the marker, but it was the same thirty years later. 

“Sacajawea, the Shoshone woman who guided portions of the Lewis and Clark Expedition led Captain Wm. Clark and his party of ten men over an old buffalo road through this pass on July 15, 1806. They were eastward bound and planned to explore the Yellowstone River to its mouth where they were to rejoin Captain Lewis and party who were returning via the Missouri River. 

In the 1860s John M. Bozeman, an adventurous young Georgian, opened a trail from Fort Laramie Wyoming, to Virginia City, Montana, across the hostile Indian country east of here. He brought his first party through in 1863 and the next year guided a large wagon train of emigrants and gold-seekers over this pass, racing with an outfit in charge of Jim Bridger. Bridger used a pass north of here. These pioneer speed demons made as much as fifteen to twenty miles a day–some days. The outfits reached Virginia City within a few hours of each other.” 

Paul had said when we were back on the bus, his voice bourbon smooth, “Always makes you wonder what they mean by hostile Indians, yeah? Crew of guys break into your house and you retaliate, does that make you hostile? Or defending your homestead?” 

Knuckles weren’t a thing back then. You high-fived or gave a rock and roll sign, or simply nodded. Dad reached behind his head and offered his fist. Paul knocked his knuckles against it.

I put the photos away and set my phone aside and closed my eyes. Sleep found me soon after.