My grandfather was born in this one-stoplight town
and so was his Marilyn Monroe-esque mother.
They traveled west when he, with his club foot,
and his brother were small boys; wanna-be cowboys.

More than fifty years later my own father and I travel
down the same dirt road to say our farewell to our last piece
of family history. My great grandmother has finally found
her way home. We’ll spread her ashes in the nearby river.

The color in the wooden picket fence is washed out. The house
and big wrap-around porch lie back further. The current owners
aren’t home so instead of a tour each of us takes a peek inside
the dusty windows. Instantly, we’re taken back to the 1930’s
when putting bread and butter on the table what mattered
for a man with a young wife and two small sons.

My cousins and I spend most of our time getting lost. We usually
end up in the Super 1 Foods or sneaking into the hotel’s casino.
There’s a convenience store too. Montana leaves us both confused
and amazed. To us, this trip is just another excuse to miss school
and that big chemistry test we weren’t hadn’t yet studied for.

Our parents, aunts, uncles and grandmother weren’t just losing
the old, white-haired lady who lived in the basement. To them
she was ‘Nana’ and ‘Mom.’ They spent their days wrapped in memories
of their wedding day or birthday parties. “It can’t be. Tell me it’s not true,”
my own grandmother, wearing all black and too much make up cries.