I'm back home in St. Ignatius, Montana for the annual family visit. I grew up here in this tiny town of about a thousand people in the Mission Valley of the Rocky Mountains. It's beautiful here. I had a twelve mile run on the training schedule for the weekend so I struck out at 6:30 AM for what turned out to be a jog down memory lane. I decided to run around the town a bit and then head out towards farm country to crank out the miles. I was nearly to the high school when I came upon a road that I have never been down before. I don't know why in the seventeen years I lived in Mission that I had never had cause to travel down Griffin Lane. I guess I don't know any Griffins. In any case, it was a dead end and I turned around rather quickly, but not before a lady drove past me with her window down smoking a cigarette. The smoke combined with the smell of fresh grass made me think of Ireland, where the Irish need there morning cigarette the way Americans need their morning coffee. I ran past the Methodist Church, where I spent many Sundays growing up, and my whole Forth Grade year with Mrs. K while the new elementary school was being built. It is a private home now, with significantly better landscaping and (I hope for the new owner's sake, better plumbing). I proceed past the school which has grown in size somewhat, but not in personality. The whole thing is beige now, without a bit of blue or red trim to be seen and not a mural in sight. Beige paint must have been on sale or else there was some obscure catch in the latest round of grants, or maybe they just cut the art department. I guess they cut the track and field program too, because as the track comes into view, I see that there are waist high weeds growing out of the track itself. You'll be glad to know the football filed in the center is weed free and green (owing to the irrigation pipes I would have to leap across if I run the track). Every school has its priorities. Giving the track a pass, I head down the hill and over the bridge crossing Mission Crick (that's Creek to those of you who didn't grow up here). I spent lots of hot summer days playing in the creek and wishing I had a cool girls name like Samantha that could be shortened to a cool boys name like Sam. Christina/Chris and Andrea/Andy also fit this scenario depending on my mood. From here, I headed out of town on St. Mary's Lake Road. The 35 mph speed limit on these rural roads is really just the faintest suggestion. Fortunately these speed demons are also exceedingly polite, scooting to the other side of the road at least a half mile away and giving me a wide berth (and usually a return wave). Very peaceful out here running towards the Mission Mountains with the sun just peeking out from behind Mt. Harding. There is also a lot of tall grass that might make a convenient screen should a girl have to pee. Just sayin'. Oddly, the dogs out here are all chained or fenced, while the dogs in town seem to run wild through the streets. I see a sign in the distance with what looks like two pieces of burnt toast. As I get closer, I see that it is depicting the Ten Commandments. Surely this is a joke I think, as it appears to be in front of a post and timber business and not say, a church. Then I catch the subtitle, "The Wages of Sin are Death" and decide to run a little faster past this place lest they decide to take their shotgun to this heathen Sunday runner. I turn on to Airport Road and head through recetntly minted Amish Country. There were no Amish here when I graduated, but a colony has since settled in the area. Though I don't see anyone today, I have seen them biking to town or riding along in a wagon this trip. I finally pass the airport for which the road is named, and there are several shiny new hangers. At least, I think they are hangers. I suppose they could be storage units, which seems to be the latest cottage industry craze around here. Even my Dad got in on that one (or maybe he started it). Dismayingly, I also see signs offering the surrounding fields up for development, complete with an artist's rendering of a big shopping center and planned neighborhood. This makes me terribly sad. I don't want to think about the day when I come back for a run down memory lane, and find out it is a paved four-lane highway.
