After Little Bighorn

That was a brief visit. We really have a lot of ground to cover, but I took Aloe in her cage with us and we went to the visitor center and heard the first part of a “Battle Talk.” We would have liked to stay more if not for our rush to get on the road and concern for all the stuff we’ve left in the car.

I have a real weakness for historical sites. Oddly, I’ve almost always done really poorly in history classes and I find most history books really hard to read. But I love personal accounts of historical events and time periods and I go crazy over artifacts. In a rfairly recent archaeological dig of Little Bighorn a skull was found. They were able to match up it to a photo of a real U.S. soldier and reproduce his head and face based on the two combined. There were tons of army casings too, and what interested me the most, an army fork.

More than most sites I’ve been to, the historical information at this site was intentionally vague. A map they gave differentiates between troop movements that they actually know and those that are “conjectural.” Apparently no one knows for sure just how Custer’s last stand took place, and any theories are charged with controversy about how to portray the battle fairly.

Now we’ve just crossed the border into Wyoming. This first mile has been just as breathtakingly beautiful as Montana. But every day, every mile takes us to a new home that is so far away from my family and my latest batch of friends. It’s exciting. Good things await us. But I can’t deny that it’s still scary and in some ways grows even more intimidating as we get closer.

I keep wondering about what culture shock I’ll experience.

I keep wondering, what will be beautiful to me in our new home.