Montana’s Fading Cowboy Culture

By Jim Urquhart

“It’s been a wild ride. Thank you.”

And with that Renee and Kail Mantle closed a chapter of American history. On Sunday the husband and wife team held the closing ceremonies to end the last of 11 horse drives they have completed with their company, Montana Horses, after racing over 300 horses through the western outpost of Three Forks, Montana.

The duo, a redheaded former theater major preparing for law school and a tanned wrangler who is a former rodeo champion, have been operating Montana Horses off a plot of land north of town since 1995 when they started with just 14 head of horses. Recently the plot of land has grown to 500 acres where they lease hundreds of horses, each one of which Kail and Renee know by name, to dude ranches and trail ride companies throughout the west and in many national parks. The Mantle family has a long tradition of supplying and tending to horses, leasing horses in various western states since 1964.

Last year the pair announced that they plan to begin selling the horses in their herd. According to Renee many of them will be purchased by their leasing clients. While the herd is being reduced they have added about 300 beef cattle to their land. The Mantles also plan to sell their ranch next to the Missouri River and possibly sail the world.

The Mantles opted in the direction of cattle after several years of battling to continue a thriving business in a market where horses are no longer profitable when compared to cattle; a story that seems to be becoming increasingly familiar with more stories of dude ranches and outfitters closing their doors after years in the business.

Every spring over the course of three days the herd of horses are gathered off the winter range from the mountains south of town and driven 35 miles to the Mantle’s 500 acres to be picked up by leasing clients after making a run through the middle of town where the streets are lined by thousands of people looking to catch a glimpse of the herd running past.

Doreen Lee, a wrangler from Cameron, Montana, taking part in her fourth drive noted that this type of working drive is becoming more a piece of history than contemporary knowledge. “Some day people will talk about how it was done and I can say I did it … I am so blessed to be part of it,” Doreen said.

The west is my home and ever since I can remember, cowboys have been the image of hard work, hard love and a real sense of integrity. Horses have always symbolized power and intelligence beyond what I am capable of. Without the two occupying the pastures and mountains I run to, the west doesn’t have the spirit I hold so dear. Montana is big sky country; some of the most pristine land in the world runs under the hooves of horses in this part of North America. The cowboys and cowgirls around these parts are built with hearts pumping strong and shoulders sturdy enough to carry the weight of the big sky and the mountains together.

There are cowboys and wranglers like Shad Broadman, a former world champion rodeo rider, who run through the mountains chasing barbwire fences and who is at home under the stars. In Shad I witnessed hard work and determination, but I also saw the kindness of the west. One minute he was a tough cowboy who could beat the hell out of the Marlboro Man and in the next moment he lit up with a youthful grin that breaks from under the hat when I showed him a photo I took of him riding his horse.

“I love the run and those horses… and I like the people,” Shad said. What separates this drive from the various dude ranches and trail drives is that this is a real working drive to bring the horses off the winter range and prep them to be sent across the west to their clients – but it comes with risk. Twenty-five year old Sara Fry, completing her third drive when a horse reared-up and rolled on her, luckily only breaking her clavicle bone and separating ligaments in her shoulder commented while holding her left arm in an sling, “it is the end of something you will never see again.” While standing near the horses, unable to ride again in the drive she said, “there is a saying, ‘the best thing for the inside of a man is the outside of a horse.”

Dr. Al Carr has been a wrangler on the drive for 10 years and is in charge of taking care of the injured people along the way. Most of the injuries have been minor with no fatalities, only minor head injuries and broken bones. There is also the steady cool care required while tending to a few wranglers after heavy nights of drinking by the camp fire. Carr summed it up as the drive was nearing an end, “the old west is disappearing right before our eyes”. On the fading cowboy culture, he added “it’s a goodness that defies imagination.”

Photographer Jim Urquhart documents the horse drive. Courtesy of Manuela Stefan

These strong horses have a sense of the world I have very rarely witnessed in people. They have the ability to look a man in the eyes and dissect his character. There is no faking it with a horse. They won’t buy it and they know they are the ones in control no matter who is on top. This is exactly why I don’t ride. They have the capacity to see through people and in many respects I am not ready to confront what they may show me.

At the end of the drive with the horses safely in their pastures, the Mantles dismounted with about a dozen of the horses surrounding them, vying for their attention. Renee said, “I think I did take a moment to reflect while riding on Main Street. It was awesome.” Kail noted he won’t miss the hard work required to successfully and safely complete a drive, “It’s gone as good as it has ever gone. We finally got good at it.”

“It is bittersweet, I will miss the mayhem,” said Renee.

The horse drives across the west may be coming to an end and the western way of life may be fading but through this assignment I was granted an experience I will always carry with me and hold so dear to my heart. The drive may be over, but it will live on with all of us that witnessed it.

(View a large-format selection of photos here)

Scorned by the Jews. Review – All Inclusive Adventura Cove Palace and Cancun Palace, soon to be Hard Rock.

Review – All Inclusive Adventura Cove Palace and Cuncun Palace, soon to be Hard Rock
Reposted from Tripadvisor:
We traveled March 30 – April 6 with a group of 30 (including children) in 12 rooms for a wedding and weeklong itinerary. Planning started last August through RCI. If as advertised and planned, this would have been perfect for the group and wedding. The Cove has the facilities and location for a spectacular all-inclusive experience. However; NOTHING is as promised. They are a ship without a rudder. There is no management to speak of and the staff that remains is hassled and incompetent as they try to maneuver through what appears to be a major change to Hard Rock that no one fully comprehends.

Our $1500 resort credit was dropped to $500 (not sure where that miscommunication started) so we could not do the included activities on our itinerary, the shuttles to the other hotels (where the wedding ceremony was located) were no longer running and we paid for car rental and taxis for the entire group, the recipricol all-inclusive at Palace hotels does not exist, we paid extra for the wedding, golf, cars, tips, taxis, tours, and double paid in several instances for the family (though no family rooms were available).

On day 5, we were informed that a Jewish Kosher group was moving in for Passover and occupying the entire Cove side. The restaurants were closed, the bars closed, and we were forced to pack up and move to the Cancun Beach Resort because the Adventura Spa side is adults only! The Cancun Palace is NOT a children-friendly environment – it is a haven for spring break drunken debauchery. Our activities planned for the end of the week are in Puerto Adventuras, not Cancun and now we either have to cancel and lose the money for the activity, or pay for transportation down to Playa del Carmen and lose 3 hours travel time. DISASTER. We were not compensated a penny, nor given any incentive to make this major and very inconvenient change.

I am interested to know if any of the prior Cove responses to complaints ever came to fruition. We saw this type of ineffective patronization over and over again. We never walked into the lobby without witnessing a disappointed and angry encounter.

To top it all off, I am writing this from our room in Cancun (where we holed up eagerly awaiting our departure and to avoid the throngs of partying minors and clueless adults) nursing the second bout of food poisoning from the poorly run restaurants. Don’t order any seafood at these restaurants. We need a nap, as the first drunk teenager accidentally called our room at 1:30am last night, and the halls echoed with slurred screaming until about 3am.

If you go to Mexico expecting All-Inclusive standards – you will be disappointed. If you go to a Palace Resort expecting Mexican standards – this is normal. If you want Hard Rock, go to Las Vegas – the weather is the same and you can drink the water. If you want real Mexico, avoid Cancun altogether.

You Can Always Go Home

At a certain age, going home becomes bittersweet. Often it is for a wedding, more and more for a funeral. I just returned from my home town, Sioux Falls, South Dakota, where we laid Sherrie Daniels to rest at Hills of Rest, the very address where I grew up. (Yes, I was raised on a cemetery.) Usually a chore, this trip home was different. There is nothing quite like traveling home and for the first time realizing you are visitor to the place you once called home.

Things look smaller. People appear foreign and strange. The muscle memory instincts while maneuvering around are gone. Sioux Falls is now just a city that brings me back occasionally to close a chapter of a book written long ago. It lacks its luster in my mind. It is not meaningless, but it has become insignificant. Gone are those nagging emotions brought on by unfinished business, past tumult, old quandaries, and the disquiet of an uncertain future. No more searching desperately for someone to impress or shrinking from falsely perceived greatness. I have grown up. The struggle is over.

As I fly back to Montana in the early daylight over a pale full moon washed morning landscape, I thank you Sioux Falls, you broken egg shell kind of town. Someday I may need you again, but for now the rest of the world lays waiting for me to explore. When I am ready to return home, who knows where it will be? I have detached myself from place and am a citizen of the land, wind, and waters of the whole earth.

Someday, I’d like to visit Sioux Falls, South Dakota for the first time. It looks like a nice town.

Eleuthera, Bahamas fishing.

Our idea of fishing in the Bahamas usually involves a spear and magic helmet. We are hunters and gatherers really, not fishermen. A Hawaiian sling, snorkel and fins, and hand line with sloppy bait of the day make up our arsenal of proven favorites.  A half day off a small boat alongside the reefs usually nets us enough for a week.

On the first trip to Eleuthera, we found Nehemiah Taylor accidentally.  We were touring the bays and came upon his boat.  “Boat” is a term I use loosely, it was more like a semi-floating live well tied next to a huge pile of conch shells.  We put a note in it and asked him to take us fishing.  He called the next day and we have been fishing with him every year since.  This man is an expert at finding lobster, conch, and reef fish.  You will have to have your own boat and he is a little hard to get ahold of, but well worth a day just to see how the real men do it.  Be hardy and bring your own gear, you will dive for your own lobster and conch and use your own poles.  Nehemiah does not run a fishing guide outfit that we know of, he’s just a fisherman with great skills.  If you are lucky enough to tag along, you will learn a great deal about fishing the Bahamian way.  His phone number is (242) 334-8369.  He operates out of the southern end of the island.

This year, we could not get out with Nehemiah because of the extreme rip tides off the Atlantic side, so we broke with tradition and went sport fishing on the west side in a deep-sea boat.  This was an exceptional experience and I cannot recommend enough our new favorite sport fisherman, Irwin Gibson.  Mr. Gibson owns, operates, and captains Double D & I Sport Fishing Adventures out of Davis Harbor near Wemyss Bight.  It is worth the trip to south Eleuthera to see him.  You WILL catch fish.  In a half day trip, we caught tuna and mahi-mahi.  Mr. Gibson runs a first class operation, clean and professional boat and staff, and he knows how to fish.  The economy in the US has brought hard times to the tourism industry in the Bahamas.  Double D & I is surviving because he’s that good, but we would love to see him booked to capacity to keep a 3-generation fishing operation alive.  Double D & I Sport Fishing can be seen at www.doubledandi.com and you can reach  Irwin Gibson at (242) 334-0011 or on his cell at (242)422-9312 or email dgibson@batelnet.bs .

Mid-Life Mickey Mouse

I have often said that Kail and I made a conscious decision to trade travel for children.  If it wasn’t initially true, it certainly is now.  Not having children has given us extra freedom and money for travel.  Still, there is something inherently human about the desire to show others something new, to teach them something that you hope in some way causes them to alter their perception, to positively change their lives.  Parents must experience this when they teach their kids how to swim, take them on their first camping trip, introduce them to foreign food or people and languages, open their eyes to a bigger world.   The sheer delight and wonder that children experience when they see something new must be so fulfilling for parents to witness that they too feel the giddy, rejuvenating joy of youth.

This weekend, we’re headed  back to Eleuthera.  We’re taking our children.  Our fellow travelers are friends: a ranching couple in their seventies who have never been to the ocean and more tragically have never met Mickey Mouse, and neighbors and hard-working rednecks who, after many years of marriage, have never been on vacation and never left work long enough for a honeymoon.  We’re going to the Bahamas Out Islands, to break in their brand new passports in the kiddie pool.  We’ll be there for a week and then to Disney World…of course.

For us, Eleuthera and Disney are the familiar. We were raised on this.  Yearly, they feed us something that we lack in our regular diet, that we grow to crave and can’t seem to exist without. However; our friends have never tasted this delight. What will this be like, meeting Mickey Mouse in mid-life? In late life? As we teach them to snorkel (do they know they will float in salt water?), show them how to stab lobsters, and introduce them to the fast track lines, I will expect the same look of childhood fascination and delight that one would expect from real children.  I am so excited for them, even more so than for myself.  Is this what parents feel?  If so, maybe we should have remembered to have real children.

For now, we’re gathering the kids, donning our mouse ears, and heading to the beach.  If you care to join, the banana bushwackers will be in the blender.  Being “of age” has its advantages.

Stay tuned for updates as rednecks travel.

Sometimes Life Requires a Stirrup Cup

There is a tradition in the foxhunting world of offering a stirrup cup to those about to ride out. It is a drink, usually port wine or sherry, given to a rider when her feet are in the stirrups and the hunt is about to leave. The Scots call a stirrup cup “dochan doruis”, a farewell drink or drink of the door and often offer it to guests when they are about to leave the house. The English, shown through hundreds of years of literature, offered a stirrup cup, or parting drink, to those about to set off on their travels.

As an occasional foxhunter and frequent rider, I can attest that the small shot of alcohol takes enough of the edge off of nerves to forge forward with what might be an intimidating or challenging ride. It dulls the very first reactions to a daunting task, fear and anxiety. I personally am an advocate of the stirrup cup. I’m a much better rider when I drink.

I have just returned from travel and have now fully embraced the grand tradition of the stirrup cup in all above context. This might initially translate to Americans as having returned from Europe as an alcoholic. Perhaps true, I hope to justify the problem or at the very least invite others to appreciate a truly valuable custom.

Travel to foreign countries can be intimidating, especially with family, which can be daunting and especially to Americans, who can be…well, American. Different languages, currency, customs, modes of transportation, time changes, jetlag, and the ever-present fear of being recognized as a tourist, can lead to crippling fear and anxiety. This, in turn can cause one to completely miss the joy of travel and ruin a trip, or even a marriage. Some cases can be severe and downright Continental, resulting in phrases heard over the relaxed din of local chatter like, “How could you forget the tickets, Margaret?” followed by, “I remembered your shaving cream when I stayed up all night packing while you snored in the living room in front of the TV, didn’t I George?” “It’s not my fault” “I said one bag per person, not three, you figure out how to get to the next train in four minutes,” and my personal favorite, “Holy crap, what’s that in dollars!?”

Luckily, over thousands of years the Europeans have developed a very healthy appreciation for alcohol and have incorporated it into their daily lives. It is available, without judgment, at all hours of the day and from even the most unlikely places. The Germans serve beer at breakfast. The French serve Champagne and brandy in their coffee at all hours of the day. It is major part of every community’s agricultural production and the majority of it is consumed locally. It is pervasive in all lands, permeating delicately through all levels of a culture.

It took me about four days to lose the ingrained inhibition and have a glass of wine at lunch. After the perfect attitude adjustment (one glass, unless in Italy), I was able to slip into that European plane that exists alongside ours and enjoy the ride. My liquid courage gave me rosé colored glasses. My husband even started insisting I have a stirrup cup each day somewhere around 11am. It was the key to unlocking sincere enjoyment of two weeks of travel through six countries, translating five languages, utilizing four modes of travel, with three family members.

This knowledge is my personal gift to all would-be frustrated American travelers.

My toast and wish to you is, “May you lead a life that requires many stirrup cups.”

PROST!
R

Becoming Lara Croft…Seeking Novel

Three weeks ago we were asked by a casting director to submit a video and application for a popular reality TV show on which teams race around the world against each other for a million dollars. Having never seen the show and in preparation for the interview, I watched countless episodes, plotted, dieted, ran, studied languages, scoured maps, and dreamed. For three weeks I plunged into a new weird archetype, with Lara Croft as my muse. In the end; we were not cast. The let-down was surprisingly devastating.

During that three-week period, this was our normal life: We took a backcountry horseback trip into the mountains for a week, leading a pack string and another couple over precarious ledged trails, climbing over deadfall and burned out forests, scouting for bears, viewing mountaintop vistas and numerous drainages, and catching fish from the rivers using grasshoppers for bait. At home, we landed our own bush plane in our field, created alliances with exciting guests from foreign countries for quid pro quo stay-overs, tasted rare vintages of excellent wine that were brought as gifts from worldly friends here for a shooting competition, charted numerous courses on maps for those taking their own adventures into various parts of the Rocky Mountains, and planned travel itineraries for next year’s foxhunt and horse drive from originations all over the world. We worked, negotiated agreements and trades with clients, fine-tuned strategies, gathered horses off of thousands of acres of pasture, loaded a zorse, rode and taught others to ride and pack, and perfected driving a brand new ATV. (Incidentally, I love using the 4-wheeler. Screw tradition.) I drove 14 hours straight to haul horses out of a remote mountain camp, driving my 1-ton dually manual diesel and hauling a 30 foot gooseneck through impossible places on one day, sailed the Missouri River at Canyon Ferry the next, then next risked being shot while trespassing and sneaking across one of the finest private ranches that butts up against NFS to pick up four daring girls and seven horses coming out from the wilderness to the wrong trailhead. I planned our two-week, multi-country trip up the Rhine River this October using boats, trains, planes, and cars. I even started looking at backpacks and planning “wing it” routes where we could practice navigation to obscure points of interest. We were preparing for high adventure.

After the clear casting error on Hollywood’s part, I recovered from my post-starvation carb coma and disappointingly returned to normal life. I think I even cried a little. Why is normal life so boring? Is it because we are not racing against other teams for a million dollars in front of a camera?  Is it because at the end there is no clearly defined prize and no one to tell you in which place you arrived? My three-week account of real life looks a lot like high adventure to most. (Of course, our well-traveled friend Larry says the definition of high adventure is just a fuck up that you live through. He would know.)  We race for money in our business, compete with others and negotiate, have a physically demanding fast-paced outdoor lifestyle, and travel all over. But it is just us, NORMAL, everyday, ho-hum, same-ol’ same-ol’, nothing new.

One of the questions on the application for the show was “What do you like most about travel?” My honest answer was “Encountering that truly novel moment that alters how I approach my life forever.” You never know when it will happen, but when it does it is the very elixir of life, the stuff that Lara herself would risk life and fortune to obtain. When the human brain encounters something truly novel, it CHANGES, and you are changed forever. Thanks to racing to race a race I won’t end up running, I am beginning to realize that novel can happen anytime and anywhere, but you have to leave normal. It happened almost every day over the last three weeks, but I missed it because I was seeking a novelty.

I won’t be running a race around the world against other teams for a million dollars, but I have decided to race anyway. I am running my own race and it starts every morning, wherever I find myself. I am running against normal. I am racing for novel. It is the priceless prize at the end of every day of all of our amazing lives.

R

Big Announcement! Mantle Ranch for Sale

Announcing the biggest and best news of Kail Mantle’s and Renee
Daniels-Mantle’s mid-lives! We have finally and fully embraced all of the
cliches surrounding forty-something and are planning to sell the ranch and
sail around the world…literally, while we’re still young enough to enjoy it,
each other, and before senility sets in – though some may think it already
has.

So, we are offering our gorgeous 500 acre ranch, which for many years has
served as our home and headquarters for Montana Horses, Inc. as well as a
great many rip-roaring good times, for sale at www.mantleranch.com. We’ll
be making some BIG changes in the coming months. If you are still reading,
you are probably interested in those changes and how they might affect you,
or you are overcome with morbid curiosity. Either way, here are some
answers or a little more information.

1. Why are we selling? (see above) We’re ready! Over the last 20
years (yes, it’s been that long) we have developed an incredible business,
an incredible ranch, a herd of the absolute best horses in the world, and a
life we love. Life’s been very good to us, because we had a vision and the
ambition to achieve it. We were never afraid of chances or hard work. The
joy was in the journey and now we’re ready for another. We can retire when
we’re too old to move, when we are sitting in the manor with blended peas
dripping from our chins, or we can take advantage of the assets for which
we’ve sacrificed and go enjoy some of the weekends and holidays we’ve worked
through for the last two decades.
2. Where are we going? We have no idea! The world is our oyster. We
will always have an address in Montana near Bozeman, because it is our home.
We have a network of friends and family here, our pastures and horses are
here, and we love it here.
3. What are we going to do? We’ll probably never be far from the horse
business. The sky’s the limit and we have some ideas. Whatever we do,
we’ll include Kail’s new man-dog “Acey” and “Tyke” and involve The Other
Woman, wine, travel, sailing, warmth and writing in the winter – and Montana
and our horses in the summer and fall. What a life!
4. When are we going? ASAP, though we’ll phase out over as long as it
takes to do it responsibly.
5. Will we sell Montana Horses, Inc. – the business? Probably not. We
have not come across a soul we would trust with our clients or our horses in
this business. We’re selling the ranch – land and improvements. We’ll
probably have a big garage sale, but the RFD goes with the place.
6. What about our lessees? We will take care of everyone to the very
best of our abilities, especially our commercial clients who rely upon us
for their livelihood. Following this Summer Season, we will begin to make
arrangements with our lessees individually, which might include the purchase
of their lease horses at a very competitive price and terms.
7. What about our horses? We are committed to finding good homes for
our horses. They are our family, our only kids. Most of our working horses
will be for sale when the time comes and as we determine they should be
available for sale. We will offer first rights of refusal to our lessees,
and then very carefully begin to sell our horses by private treaty. Our
horses are in high demand. We will NOT sell our working horses for bid or
at auction. Our solid stock will be priced firmly between $2500 – $7500 per
head, depending upon the horse and their age and abilities. Our well-bred
AQHA ranch line will be offered separately. As they become available, we
will catalog our horses online and sell them individually, according to our
usual practices. The Kid Horse Sale in October will be held as usual.
8. HORSE DRIVE? The 2012 Horse Drive (May 4-6) will be our last Horse
Drive. If you’ve ever dreamed of removing this from your bucket list, now
is the time! We do still have some spaces for riders and on the Photo
Expedition, so book now or forever regret it. We have decided to NEVER
utter with regret the words, “I wish I had…” You should, too. This will
be a monumental Drive, in Three Forks on Derby Day, and it is sure to be
memorable (and probably tearful – especially if you whack your nuts on the
saddle horn).
9. HORSES FOR LEASE? While they are still available. We’re going to
take things as they come and if we are in a position to offer them in 2012,
we will make the call in January as usual, and honor all contracts to which
we commit.
10. HEROES AND HORSES? No change. This program is not location
specific and we are devoted to providing this opportunity for as long as it
is still of benefit.
11. PHOTOGRAPHY EXPEDITIONS? The last scheduled Expedition is during
the Drive in May 2012. However; who knows what we’ll dream up for later?
12. ULTIMATE HORSE COURSE? Closed. The new owners will determine its
future use as a private training ground or public offering.

We’re happy to talk with you about our plans and dreams or answer any
questions you have. We’re also grateful for any help you can give us as we
go about the next phase. We’re selling this ourselves, with no brokers, so
we appreciate all you can do to get the word out. Stay tuned to our website
www.montanahorses.com and blog for details about the ranch and horses. And
later, check out our travels at www.rednecktravels.com.

Finally, a heartfelt thanks to all of you over the years for making Montana
Horses a success story and giving the Mantle Ranch in Three Forks a history
of which we can all be very proud.

Kail and Renee

kail@montanahorses.com
renee@montanahorses.com

Montana Horses, Inc.
Kail Mantle & Renee Daniels-Mantle
9700 Clarkston Road
Three Forks, MT 59752
(406) 285-3541 | (406) 285-0918 fax
info@montanahorses.com
www.montanahorses.com

A Pussy Kind of Moment

Adrenaline April is already here. Seems like it comes sooner every year, since it is still March. As soon as the frost goes out, we hit the ground running and forget to eat, shower, shave, or sleep until “Sometime After Horse Drive.”

In the middle of my daily dose of mayhem, the fuzzy grey ranch cat “DeCon” slipped through the office door and landed in my lap. So did the realization that beginning in April, and lapsing through most of the year, I communicate in a daze of half attention. She sat in my lap, as I tried to type over her demanding paws, answer the telephone, and talk to someone standing in the door…doing four things half-assed, instead of granting my full attention to any one.

In a moment of weakness, I pushed the chair back from two computer screens and pet the cat, committing fully to the moment. I told her, “You are very lucky that I own you. You have an ‘in’ with the boss here and because you are family, I always have time for you.” In my mind (because I am a hopeless film fanatic), I ran through various scenes of corporate high-rise office mucky-mucks taking time to hear about their little daughter’s day at school while in the midst of multi-billion dollar deals. It felt really, really good.

Not that my life is anything like that. And yes, I realize the above admission labels me a certifiable nut job.

It occurred to me that I rarely grant the same level of attention, respect and caring to my guests, family, friends, and clients as I had just given the cat. I engage people and tasks in a preoccupied manner, even in the midst of the Horse Drive, because I am too busy thinking about planning and organizing the moment to actually live the moment.

2011 April Adrenaline? Bring it on. My cat just taught me how to handle it. I vow to commit fully to the moment, give it my full attention, and maybe for the first time ever, REVEL IN THE RUSH AT HAND.

Carpe diem, quad minimum credula postreo. (Seize the day, putting as little trust as possible in the future.) I think I’ll name my next cat Horace.

Choosing the Isle of Freedom

In a few days, I’ll be on Eleuthera, a Bahamian out-island named for the Greek word meaning  ”free”.  I’ve been thinking about freedom lately.  The word seems to be bandied about a lot in light of recent world events.  My preferred definition comes from The Objective Standard.  Freedom: The right to act in accordance with one’s judgement, free from coercion by the state or others.  I do not doubt that those who have chanted those words while rioting in the streets thought deeply about what that word means to them.

As we tie up pesky loose ends that delayed our travel and gratefully generate the last-minute money necessary to fund the trip, I am truly free.  We make our own living, create our own schedules, place our own value on experiences.  I am free to make my own decisions.  I am free to use my own judgement.  I am not coerced by the state or others.  I am reliant solely upon myself. This is a fundamental right that came at great cost to the defenders and creators of our country and it is a right that is at the foundation of the United States of America…perhaps exclusively and (dare I say) fleetingly. 

I can already feel the sea and sun on the beach of a friendly neighboring country.  Shouldn’t it be the right of every American to enjoy a couple of weeks of vacation a year? We have the right to pursue happiness, right?  Don’t we have the right to a good job and a  fair wage and paid vacation?  Isn’t it common knowledge that all human beings deserve at minimum the very basics and in a country as great as America, a standard of living well beyond the average?   

“Rights” is perhaps more thrown around now than any other word.  ”Rights” were plastered on countless protest signs across the U.S. this week, though it is a word less understood by our country than any other.  It is specifically misunderstood by our Wisconsin educators, union leaders, and politicians. 

My personal favorite explanation of rights comes (lengthily) from Ayn Rand:  A “right” is a moral principle defining and sanctioning a man’s freedom of action in a social context. There is only one fundamental right (all the others are its consequences or corollaries): a man’s right to his own life. Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action; the right to life means the right to engage in self-sustaining and self-generated action—which means: the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the furtherance, the fulfillment and the enjoyment of his own life. (Such is the meaning of the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.)  The concept of a “right” pertains only to action—specifically, to freedom of action. It means freedom from physical compulsion, coercion or interference by other men.  Thus, for every individual, a right is the moral sanction of a positive—of his freedom to act on his own judgment, for his own goals, by his own voluntary, uncoerced choice. As to his neighbors, his rights impose no obligations on them except of a negative kind: to abstain from violating his rights.  The right to life is the source of all rights—and the right to property is their only implementation. Without property rights, no other rights are possible. Since man has to sustain his life by his own effort, the man who has no right to the product of his effort has no means to sustain his life. The man who produces while others dispose of his product, is a slave.  Bear in mind that the right to property is a right to action, like all the others: it is not the right to an object, but to the action and the consequences of producing or earning that object. It is not a guarantee that a man will earn any property, but only a guarantee that he will own it if he earns it. It is the right to gain, to keep, to use and to dispose of material values. (“Man’s Rights,” The Virtue of Selfishness)  Read that through a few times and let it sink. Then, re-read it and dispel all of your arguments by remembering it applies to ALL men, not just you.

I looked through The Bill of Rights  and never once found a right to work, right to fair wage, teachers rights, workers rights, employers rights, or any of the other rights being volleyed around in the protests this month.  I perused The Constitution  and never saw “Workers Rights are Human Rights,” either.  I don’t want to risk sounding freakishly like Glen Beck, but where is the justification for this multitude of “rights” we are all claiming in American protests this month?  Are they worth fighting for, dying for, harming another individual and robbing him of his real rights - you know, the Constitutional kind?  And if so, what must the new Bill of Rights be?  Article 1-You have the right to work and you have the right to determine the value of your work and the compensation you will receive, free from coercion and reason, regardless of what you are producing, its market, or its creators.  Article 2-You have the right to not work and still be provided for by other men and the state.  Article 3-You have the right to produce anything you choose, free from coercion and reason,  providing the product of your effort is used to provide for the common rights and needs of all men.   Notice the consequential lack of the fundamental freedom – the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?

Visiting another country requires that a person be aware of its politics, customs, laws, people, etc.  We’re not traveling to Egypt this year, for obvious reasons.  We won’t be visiting North Korea any time soon.  Mexico is a little iffy these days.  We’ll probably avoid all sandy Middle East areas.  Really, who wants to visit Wisconsin, Illinois, or Ohio in March?  As US citizens, we’re pretty free to go anywhere we want, whenever we want.  We’re free to choose our profession, our amount of disposable income and time and the values on which we spend it, our quality of life.  We are not hampered in any way from attaining what we each choose to value. 

We chose to go to Eleuthera because we like the ocean there – hunting and eating lobster and conch, snorkeling, etc.  It’s warm and uncrowded.  Its few cultural attractions can be consumed in moderation.  It is a very freeing relaxed island that does not require you to engage in its internal operations (read: no mandatory guilt imposed because the European homeowners are paying the illegal Haitian gardeners slave wages, the passing cruise ships are polluting the sea, or a gallon of milk costs $10).  There,  you turn inward as you look outward and come home with new perspective, appreciation, and drive.  We chose to create a business that is seasonal and affords us the time and money to travel where we choose in the winter.         

We’re all humans with the same fundamental right to life.  Our brains are no different from the oppressed brains in the Middle East or uneducated brains in Wisconsin.  However; only America is based upon that right and we ALL have choice.  We ALL can choose our life, on our own, with no coercion from anyone.  We are ultimately responsible for that life.  For now, we have true freedom and a free market (kind of) to compliment it.  We are champions, gods that can walk across the world with no incumbrances – no coercion by the state or other men. 

WHY WOULD WE NOT CHOOSE THE LIBERTY AND OPPORTUNITY THAT HAS BEEN LAID AT OUR FEET?

If you have CHOSEN to become a dependent of the state or a company that doesn’t pay you enough, that doesn’t provide for your family, that doesn’t afford you a few weeks in the Bahamas, that doesn’t satisfy your heart’s desires – CHOOSE SOMETHING DIFFERENT.  We’re not slaves. We’re not victims.  We’re not Canadians.  We are gods, masters of the universe, free men.  Capitalize on your right and your freedom and the dumb luck that caused you to be born in this country at this time in history.

I’m going to the Bahamas.  Because I can.  I have the right.  I have the freedom.

Long Live Lady Liberty.