The reluctant rescuer

G. GEORGE OSTROM / For the Hungry Horse News

Had nice chat this week with a friend I hadn't seen for decades but who has followed my column all these years. One oldie which still stands out in his memory concerned an ordeal at Moose City, fixing a pickup. Am reviewing that type of event because it will alert new fathers to a fact of life, "Raising sons isn't easy."

In the mid '70s I wrote about using a scarce day off to drive 56 miles over the rough, crooked North Fork Road to replace a fuel pump on our pickup. It had quit and been left by eldest son Shannon at Moose City. Had difficulty writing the story the next day because fingers where still raw and knuckles split from amateur mechanical activities. That column ended, "When the new fuel pump was at last in place and I lay exhausted and bleeding upon the ground 80 miles from home, I asked Shannon to get in and see if the pickup would start. That is when he almost pushed me over the edge by casually asking, 'Did YOU bring the key?'"

With this event forever imbedded in my memory, imagine my feelings 16 years later (1990) when I received a collect call from the remote Park ranger station at Polebridge. It was Shannon and his younger brother Clark who had gone up the North Fork to find trout, mushrooms and adventure. My boys reported, "Dad, the pickup quit on us a little north of here, and the starter just makes a clicking sound."

Gave up a relaxing Saturday afternoon nap and went to the parts store for a new starter motor, electrical connectors, a fuel pump, condensers, solenoid, battery and anything else the salesman thought might be causing trouble. With a couple hundred dollars worth of parts in the car, I finally headed for the northern reaches of Glacier Park. We've all seen "Teddy Roosevelt" highways but that road from Columbia Falls to Polebridge was surely the "Roughest Rider" in the western world. Hit one pothole that jolted fillings from an upper molar.

There were so many chuckholes on the big flat by Ladenburg's, people had been driving in the ditches and even detouring into the woods. There were sections of mud too, which made the road slick and slimy in several spots.

I expected to find stranded sons working on the vehicle or at least searching for mushrooms and fishing for family food. NOT! They were in the camper munching cheesed crackers and playing cribbage. Judging from the accumulated crumbs, they had been playing since calling me four hours earlier. It was plain to see my boys were not raised during the "Great Depression." When I questioned their lack of productive activity, they said they had engaged in a chance of skill, "To take their minds off being stranded in the wilderness."

I actually considered turning around and leaving them but had to consider two things, "Those fully grown hairy creatures were once innocent little boys whose Daddy always looked after them." The second reason was less emotional. "They were using my pickup."

In the engine I spotted a metal 'spidery thing" bolted to the side of the compartment. It was on the main electrical line running from the battery, so I decided to take it off and put on a new one. That is how I learned a person should unhook battery cables first or electric shocks jolt your arm out of the socket, and other wires start smoking.

With burn salve and bandages in place, I got that electrical gizmo replaced. The pickup started right off. I followed the boys to town but they drove faster. Came in the house as Clark was telling his mother, Iris, how "Dad's mustache had stuck straight out and quivered." All three apparently saw humor in that phenomenon, because … there was snickering.

After a very late supper I suggested the boys should buy four new decks of cards. Shannon asked, "Why," so I said, "Well Son! You guys like to hunt, fish, hike, ski and generally get into the back country. Sooner or later your rig is going to break down again and there you'll be. The way I've got it figured … you'll need a long term supply of playing cards … before ANYONE comes to get you."

G. George Ostrom is a Kalispell resident and a national award-winning Hungry Horse News columnist.