Twelfth chapter

Counting possessions in Billings

Dust

House Of Earth

I Know All About It

Place In My Heart

Death Came

Doors Of Heaven

Louisiana Story

The Ghosts Of Highway 20

Lucinda Williams

Many of us have heard the phrase "the one who has got the most possessions when he dies wins".

In Billings, I stay in an air bnb, where there are very many possessions. The kitchen contains all the home appliances I have heard of – and some more. Here is a home cinema with hundreds of movies. The music room has a grand piano, a range of guitars, some wind instruments, a drum set and a large control table. The library contains thousands of books. The living room reminds me of a larger art gallery. In the garage uphill there is an expensive looking SUV, a roofless sports car, a Cadillac of the 1956 model and two Harley Davidson motorcycles.

It's almost that I think this home has inspired the phrase "too much is not enough". I'm making a  quick count and I'm sure there are over 100,000 possessions here. Wondering why they rent rooms in their villa. In order to buy even more things?

If I'm thinking about that, I'll have almost as many possessions at home in Sweden, although I definitely do not want to win the competition having most things when I die.

Sometimes I think about how many hours work every unnecessary gadgets represents. How long have I worked in the forest to buy things that I do not need? It is definitely OK working in the woods, which is so nice. I'm glad I'm not a bureaucrat, a police, a healthcare professional or a parking guard to buy unnecessary things. Just to name a few examples.

I think about the people who continue to work after they have reached retirement age. Some probably do that because they have a low pension and really need the money for food and rent. Many keep on because they have a fun job that gives them confirmation. When Neil Young is touring after passing 70 years with a good margin, it's hardly because he would not have money for food otherwise. And when the Swedish actresses Yvonne Lombard and Meta Velander in their 90's are starring in new plays, they do not do it to make it possible to buy more gadgets. It is likely that they are having fun and getting confirmation from the audience.

When I have worked in the forest, I have not received any confirmation immediately. The trees have not been cheering when I did a good day job. Nevertheless, I have been so pleased with almost every day in the forest that I cannot remember a single bad day. Even days when I have been freezing my toes and ears off, I have been happy to get the benefit of working in the woods. Now that, for physical reasons, I have stepped down my work, without wanting to whine over it, I miss these hard days of cleansing and days when I have planted and other days when I walked around in the woods, wondering what to plant on which area.

At the same time, I am privileged to have my own forests. I remember how they looked 40 years ago and can be happy about how they developed.

It's about 35 years since I visited Billings for the first time. What I especially remember in addition to the nice relatives, who unfortunately now either moved to the west coast or for their eternal rest, is that the city was so similar to the American myths that I impregnated with in so many movies.

One night I was with the older generation to what they called "a real western saloon". Before we got there, I thought we were going to a Disney-like tourist spot. When we arrived, it was a very simple place in an industrial area. Naked lamps were the only lighting. The waitresses went around with smoking cigarettes in the corner of their mouths. The steaks were so big that they hung over the edge of the plates. Some guests were armed. I commented that the only thing missing was a revolver fight. It often happens here, my relatives said without wanting to scare me.

Another evening, a representative of the younger generation took me to Grandma's place, a place where young people gathered. We went there in some kind of homemade monster truck of the Chevrolet brand. On the way we picked up two girls. As a well-behaved Swedish I tried to crawl into the backseat, but no, all four would be in the front seat. The first thing that met us at Granma's Place was a huge parking lot. Almost all young men were wearing leather boots, blue jeans, checkered shirts and cowboy hats. When I looked around, I discovered that all girls were dressed almost the same without hats. Many had ponytails. Some girls had tight t-shirts instead of checkered shirts. On one part of the parking lot a drag race was going on. In another part, fights continued with the fists. However, I did not see any revolvers.

Although there were many in the parking lot, the core of Granma's place was a building that looked like a big warehouse. It probably had been too, but now it consisted of a big room with a stage at one  side and one bar at the other and a slightly smaller room also with a stage and a bar. On the larger stage, a rock band played that probably did its best to sound like the Rolling Stones. On the smaller stage played a country band, which seemed to do its best to sound like the Flying Burrito Brothers. In the bars only beer was served. Most visitors had a beer in their hands. Many danced with the beer bottle. Beers was dropped, so the floor was foaming. The cost of a beer was one dollar a bottle, which was cheap even then.

I never saw Granma herself. With my 37 years at the time, I was probably the oldest at Granma's place, possibly except for her.

A less fun part of Billings 35 years ago was a street in the center, where there were many drunk Indians. I think there was some sort of employment agency there.

Now I find none of these places. In the center, several high houses have been built and Billings seems much bigger now than 35 years ago. Although it is far to metropolitan areas like Los Angeles and New York, the city seems to attract people living in the many smaller places of Montana.

Then I also visited a small town west of Billings, which I forgot what it's called. This town was founded by Finnish immigrants. Almost all street names in the center were Finnish.

When I first learned about the multiculturalism in the United States, it was in New York's exciting mix of neighborhoods dominated by different nationalities. A day's walk could feel like a trip around the world. Harlem, Spanish Harlem, Chinatown and Little Italy were neighborhoods where I would like to stroll around and experience some different food smelling, looking at quite different things in the shop windows than on the Fifth avenue. In these districts I experienced a much more intense life.

When Isaac Singer received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1978, Sweden's television showed a documentary, where the he wandered in his hoods, where he met many nice people of the same Jewish descent as himself. It inspired me to travel to New York for the first time.

Still, I was surprised when I arrived at the small Finnish town in Montana. It felt like my perspective widened, a bit like when as a teenager I worked in a Swedish factory with 50 percent Finnish workers.

It is strange that the United States is now planning to close the borders. As I see it, it is really unamerican.

Now I go to what I should see in Billings today. It is more than 150 miles to Yellowstone National Park. I missed it last time and I will miss it now. I compensate a little by visiting the Yellowstone Art Museum showing a series of pictures of animals, cows, horses, sheep, birds and buffalo. I also visit the Yellowstone County Museum, where I can, among other things, look at revolvers, knives and other things that have historically characterized Billings. This museum also showed the darker sides of the city's history.

Western Heritage Center has partially similar content.

Boothill Cemetery is a funeral place for anyone who died with the boots on.

I also visit Yellowstone Cellars & Winery. The wine tastes better than expected, but I honestly had not expected any wonders. A few years ago I bought a bottle of red wine with strawberry flavor, made in New York State. Since that I'm skeptical of wine from the United States, California, excluded.

In the evening I am in my air bnb room thinking of all my belongings. When I get home, I want to do a thorough cleaning of belongings, so my wife and my children will not have to deal with them when I die.

What I do not need myself and do not believe has any value, I intend to donate to the Red Cross. What I think has some value should I try to sell. Then I do not have the money to end up in the pockets of the flea market professionals, but I can donate them to any organization that makes them useful.

Sometimes I wonder how I thought when I bought the unnecessary but beautiful things. Did I think I would bring them to my coffin when I was buried? No, before, I lived a lot more in the present without the least thought that I would get old and die.

But it's a little pointless to lie here and criticize myself for what I did a long time ago. Now it's time to think about what I really need over the years as an old man. That is why it is important not to buy more unnecessary things. Perhaps it is also possible to sell the large farm and move to a smaller dwelling in a city. What has begun to bother me where I live is that more of my neighbors say that they are voting for the racist party Sweden Democrats. And the more sympathetic, those who vote for the farmers party, think the countryside becomes alive if only the tax on fossil fuels becomes as low as possible. 
Or maybe I'll stay on the farm and try to get started a new business that can create more jobs.

The next day I borrow a bike from my hosts and cross the Yellowstone River. I'm looking for Bitter Creek Outfitters to take a ride. Except for three hours in San Francisco I have avoided both cycling and riding, scared of how it could affect the prostate. But what the hell, it's better to burn out than to fade away.

This may be the last chance in life to ride on a horse back in the Wild West. When my daughters were teenagers we had several horses at the farm and I took the chance to ride a lot. It happened that I took a horse instead of the car out in the woods to do my day work, so I feel at home with horses.

Two hours on the horses back is a magical experience, where I can almost imagine I'm Buffalo Bill or Captain Micky or any other of the heroes of the West I read of as a child. The black stallion I have hired is calm and kind. I do not fall from the saddle, even though I'm taking several selfies on my horse back to post on Facebook when I get back to the host people's fast wifi.

As I get off my horse there is a shooting range and a forest of ugly advertising signs. I look at what it is about and is invited to borrow a revolver at a low fee and shoot at five beer cans 25 meters away. As a moose hunter I have no trouble hitting all the cans.

Since I managed the first moment without problems, I am offered to shoot towards moving targets. I can borrow a rifle and shoot a silhouette of a bear moving so far away that I cannot really appreciate the distance. With the help of both luck and skill, I manage to hit three of three metal bears hanging in a moving wire.

Then they offer me to get on the black stallion armed with a rifle. The task is to hit a moving target from the trotting horse. I try to shine by getting the horse galloping before I shoot. I totally fail here, but am still pleased that I managed to shoot without falling off.

If I had been Elvis in the movie Flaming Star I had managed to shoot, gallop, sing and play the guitar at the same time. Or maybe not.

Here in Montana is much more autumn like than it has been earlier on the trip, but the shifts in red and gold are beautiful and the high, clear air really makes the colors even more beautiful. Would I like to live here like an aged cowboy? Could I imagine selling the farm at home buying a small farm here to play the western life I dreamed of as a child?

No, it's too far from the ocean, too far from the grandchildren home in Sweden and probably far too many idiots living here, considering Donald Trump won the Montana election with a good margin.

In the evening I am invited to beer and sandwiches by my hosts. I tell them I'm on a trip to figure out how to live the rest of my old age. My host couple, Alex and Patsy, are around 35 years old and prove to have a lot of ideas about how old men like me can have fun, but not always in a reasonably responsible manner.

They think we could form a group to make fake phone calls to politicians and bureaucrats.

One idea is to arrange a triathlon competition, where the lower age limit is 70 years.

They suggest that we start a TV station with just fun programs for old-age guys, like hidden camera with elements where old men drive cars like crazies, make love in the streets and visit a youth farm and rap on stage.

Why not organize partner exchange, where old people can try to live together with someone else a week a month?

They want us to collect money that half to go for charity and to the second half to a really big rave party for us oldies.

I protest finding it very boring to just hang out with old people. Now Alex and Patsy have a series of ideas that make old and young people do things together. I'm a bit hesitant whether young kids wants to do things with us oldies, but my hosts are convinced that many young people think it's fun to hang out over the generation boundaries. It can be educational for all ages as well. Let's learn from each other!

No, I will probably not start any of the activities Alex and Patsy suggest when I get home, but later on in bed I decide to open up reopen me for conversations with both young and old for the rest of the trip. Tomorrow I will continue to Denver, also this time by bus because the Billings railroad is closed. The journey will take eleven hours, which is quite all right, especially as the road seems to be pretty beautiful and goes through the state of Wyoming for the most part.

Alex gets up at five o'clock in the morning and drives me and my old suitcase to Greyhound station.

On the bus I get several difficult coughing attacks just after the departure. Is it a cold or is it air conditioning? I'm not terrified, but several friendly fellow travelers want to help me. A San José woman sits behind me and handles a bag of cough pills and some tea bags and water from a thermos to cure my cough.

The United States is so contradictory. So many people are so friendly, so it's hard to understand that there's a hate that has made it possible electing a racist president. Are the hateful and the friendly two different types of people or are we so complicated that we can have both love and hatred within us?

I think we have a little of each within us. It is probably not so that those who vote for Sweden Democrats and Donald Trump are completely evil. They might be kind to their dogs and cats.

From Kurt Andersson's Facebook 

Megan Reeves, Albuquerque

Is there anyone interested in starting a group working to win the next election? I think we should use words to fight all bad things Donald Trump says and does.

We have to work to strengthen the Democratic party to get a lot new faces for the next election. We need more young people with competence to fight ignorance and fascism.

Peter Moore, Dallas

I am writing a paper on victims of crimes. Are there any of my Facebook friends who are victims? Would it be possible to make an interview with you?

Mia Turner, New Orleans

I want to find some new beers to serve in my bar. Which are your favorite beers?

Sonny Smith, Memphis

Hi Kurt! Do you remember the party we had in the apartment of our drummer Bart? And the girls who asked me to go to bed with them? After a show I met them again in Alex’s apartment and they asked if I hade changed my mind.

Now I am more self-assured than just a few weeks ago, so I said yes. It was absolutely wonderful. Thank you for encouraging me!

Emma Jones, Portland

Now I have some doubts about Donald Trump. His attitude against Russia is scaring. His bad attitude against women is even worse.  I wish I could change my mind and not vote at all.

Robert Nelson, Kansas City

Hi Kurt! Remember I wrote you about meeting in Chicago or Detroit. I am really sorry but that is impossible now. I suffer from a prostate problem and a urinary infection that have taken most of my energy away. I am now waiting for surgery, but I might have to wait for more than a month and then I guess you are back in Sweden. But I still hope it is possible to meet in Europe next spring.

Burt Anderson, Portland

Kurt! Now I have joined the Facebook community and explored all the new opportunities. I have looked at all the nice pictures from your trip and am looking forward to following you in the future. I hope to be able to report from the lives of our family.

Facts about Billings

• Billings is located in the state of Montana and is the state's largest city.

• The city had 109 059 inhabitants in 2013.

• Montana State University Billings has approximately 5,000 students. An increasing proportion of students have Native American backgrounds.

• Agriculture has characterized the industry in Billings. The land around Billings is very fertile. In Montana there are also large cattle herds. There are also many energy companies. Billings is also a city that is considered very good to start business in.

• Billings has eight micro breweries.

Read more at www.visitbillings.com