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I can’t stop looking at houses in Montana. Call it escapism. It could be the call of the wild. Maybe I just want to drop the entire life I’ve built for myself, just ghost the hell out of here and give into my primal urges of blowing my life savings and 401(k) on a ranch in the Mission Mountains. Big ideas only.
One problem: I don’t think I could run an entire ranch by myself, let alone afford the day-to-day costs associated with running said ranch. But hey, if Tim Riggins can go to jail for chopping up ‘98 Mercedeses and still buy a bunch of land in Texas, then Brian McGannon can sure as shit grab up 60 acres in Western Montana for his personal Big Sky palace. I’d grow veggies, have some horses, listen to Nathaniel Rateliffe all day, make my own beef jerky from locally sourced beef, learn how to hunt with a bow, shoot guns and drink beer. The American Dream, really. Even if I don’t know how to make deer jerky, scare off a brown bear or shoot a hunting bow, I feel like a long afternoon going down some YouTube rabbit holes would easily fix that.
Real estate speculation happens to be a hobby of mine. I’m always on the lookout for a hot deal. You guys ever watch Beachfront Bargain Hunt? It’s exhilarating. Somebody finding a Hemingway-style hideaway on Siesta Key for less than $500k gets me absolutely rock hard.
After a few Coors yellow cans the other day, I found this incredible 2,700 sq. ft. 3B2B in Kalispell in my price range. “The Highwayman” started playing on Spotify and I will tell you this: I have never been closer to buying that damn cabin sight unseen and moving my life up to the Rocky Mountains, never to be seen again.
I wouldn’t have even said goodbye. I feel like that’s the kind of move that people would understand. That’s not like me packing up and moving to New York or Scottsdale or Miami. I think most of my friends and family would be like, “Well, that makes sense.” I already live by myself. I am single, with very little interest in not being single (“It’s not the horniness, Jim. It’s the loneliness”). I have very little to tie me down. I’d be a fool not to do this, right?
I don’t think loneliness would be that big of a problem, either. Everyone I know would want to come visit. You know how psyched your friends and family would be to go to Montana instead of other vapid millennial relocales? Montana FUCKS. “You guys going to visit cousin Jeff in San Francisco? Tight. I’m gonna be drinking rye on my back porch looking at the Rockies wondering how my life could possibly get any better, while smugly laughing at all the suckers back in civilization.” Then I’d have a brief panic attack after remembering that the nearest hospital and Walmart is 45 minutes away. You would have to take the good with the bad, I guess.
Then, winter would come. I’d be holed up in my gorgeous cabin with nowhere to go, no one to keep me company…oh, wait. I got a GD snowmobile in this fantasy. Fire up the old ET, just gonna send it. Gonna be a good day.
Montana’s state name is “The Treasure State.” You don’t just name a state that unless there’s actually treasure in the state. I don’t think they were talking about nature’s splendor and the awe of the Rockies when they gave it that nickname. No, there’s actual treasure there, and I intend to find it.
You can laugh all you want. I’ll be the one living in a palatial wood cabin in Whitefish after discovering El Dorado in 2025. I’m playing chess while everyone else is playing checkers. .
Image via Shutterstock
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Brian McGannon
What do I love? I love happy hour, a good golf tan, and getting moderately drunk during dinner.
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Make sure your cabin has a solid WiFi connection, you’ll probably die if you don’t have access to YouTube videos to teach you how to not be so soft.
That’s the big bitch of living in the middle of nowhere. Not only are you disconnected because of the lack of people, but you also don’t have the ability for a digital escape because the internet is so slow. Also no one to have sex with….that one really sucks.
Not having sex anyway. PGP
No shit… I’m in the middle of the damn city and I still don’t smash on the reg.
And by “on the reg” I mean ever.
Sister just bought her first house in Montana. Never been more jealous of anyone in my entire life.
PGP corporate retreat 2k18
“I am in love with Montana. For other states I have admiration, respect, recognition, even some affection, but with Montana it is love and it’s difficult to analyze love when you’re in it. . . . It seems to me that Montana is a great splash of grandeur. The scale is huge, but not overpowering. The land is rich with grass and color and the mountains are the kind I would create if mountains were put on my agenda. Montana seems to me what a small boy would think Texas is like from hearing Texans. Here for the first time I heard a definite regional accent unaffected by TV, a slow-paced warm speech. It seemed to me that the frantic bustle of America was not in Montana. Its people did not seem afraid of shadows. . . . The calm of the mountains and the rolling grasslands had got into the inhabitants. It was hunting season when I drove through the state. The men I talked to seemed to me not moved by a riot of seasonal slaughter but simply to be going out to kill edible meat. . . . It seemed to me that the towns were places to live rather than nervous hives. People had time to pause in their occupations to undertake the passing art of neighborliness.
I found I did not rush through the towns to get them over with. I even found things I had to buy to make myself linger. . . . Montana has a spell on me. It is grandeur and warmth.”
-John Steinbeck
Brian, you should also read “Lonesome Dove” if you’re looking for some Montana motivation.
“Two former Texas Rangers (Robert Duvall, Tommy Lee Jones) renew their spirit of adventure as they and several other residents of a small Texas town join a cattle drive to the Montana Territory.”
All in.
Not to be “that guy” but read the book. I debated reading it twice in a row. It’s that good.
A friend moved to Jackson Hole, WY and now gets paid to work on a dude ranch for doing things like taking rich assholes on hunting trips, building fires, playing the guitar around said fire, making them dinner, etc. just basically giving them the stereotypical “western” experience. I’ve never been so jealous of a facebook acquaintance in my life
Reading this isn’t very good for focus at work on a Friday
Focus and Friday don’t mix anyways.
Referring to watching Beachfront Bargain Hunt as “real estate speculation”. PGPM
just dump out your 401k and live the dream out there. that 401k is most likely gonna be gone when you go to try and collect it decades from now. the future is now, so live it. grow a bunch of pots and shoot salmon with a rifle and slap grizzly bears in hibernation and build massive bonfires just for yourself to get drunk next to. it will be the best things and stuff
I’m investing enough to get the full match from my company on my 401k (trying to aggressively pay off loans), but I think gambling 5-25% of my income and enjoyment potential that I’ll make it to 59 1/2 is a bad bet.
Do what my friend did, buy a house and become a white water rafting guide. She gets paid to have fun in nature.
I’m trying to relax, not die in a horrific drowning accident.
Just be the guy who checks out equipment.
Also, my mom actually grew up in Kalispell, look more toward Bozeman. More to do.
Montana will ruin any man. Spend a week there fly fishing or skiing and you’ll have tears streaming down your face as the plane begins to push back on the tarmac. Insanely beautiful and peaceful place.
Truth. The Bozeman airport was one of the happiest and then saddest experiences of my life.
I can teach you all that shit Brian. Just ask.