Bear Paw Meanderings

Hasn’t this weather been tough on so many of us? Just hot and hotter and hotter and little or no rain and the National Weather Service says it is going to stay that way all through the rest of July.

I was afraid to ask them about August.

I can well remember going through drought periods like this before. Now, this is not really true but I once said that in the 1980’s there was a period of one summer what there was never a cloud in the sky. Never! Only the incessant sun day after day after day.

Then in the 1990’s in another very dry period there was that horrible fire that started on lower Little Box Elder Creek and went all the way to Cleveland, even killing a couple of people if memory serves.

I will tell you one thing that I will never forget about that fire. I was living at the old Faber Homestead on Little Box Elder Creek at the time and on one hot and smoky night, there was a line of cars coming from Clear Creek and points east down to the Beaver Creek road and into Havre. That line of cars lasted all night long that night and, believe me, it seemed to me that that night would never end.

Shortly after all that I decided to go to work in Glacier National Park for a time and moved to Somers. People looked at me like I had lost all my marbles. They said I would hate the weather in the Flathead Valley as no one sees the sun all winter long. I thought that was just fine as I had seen way too much of the sun as it was.

So, I moved to Somers and loved every year I spent there. Foggy days, Mists that lasted for three days, they were just my cup of tea!

A few years ago I came back home and must say that most of that time we have been blessed by having wet years and plenty of rain and snow and it has just been a grand land.

Now we are back to hot and more hot. Let’s hope that that heat gets over with soon and we are back to plenty of rain to make our crops really grow and our dispositions to stay calm as well.

Think cool!

Think rain!