Why I Love Montana

I love Montana because my grandmother was born here in 1897 to parents who came from Norway to start a new life in the Land of Opportunity. Then my mother came along in 1925. I came in 1953, and my son in 1975.

My son started his family here in 1994, and Montana will always remain my home.

By LINDIE GIBSON, Livingston

For a place to be called "home," it needs to be more than a place to tie your horse to a hitchin’ post and pitch your tent, or a railway stop at the end of the line.

Montana is an environment offering a variety of opportunities and experiences coinciding with the awe and wonder of nature–a place where people realize that earning a good living is not as important as the experience of true living–the way it was meant to be.

Montana is a place where you can hold your head high and see limitless sky and feel purifying wind blowing through your hair–where you can study a starry night ceiling, unshrouded by big city lights.

It’s a place where your neighbor is your friend, where strangers still reach out with a helping hand, and where a man’s word and handshake are as good as any piece of paper.

Montana is a place where living in the slow lane is a much preferred lifestyle–where watching a colt or frisky young calf run and dance in a field is better than the best programming TV has to offer–where hiking and camping and fishing diminish the lure of holiday cruises and Disneyland–for making and sharing memories while our children grow.

Montana is a place where the roar of the hustle and bustle of life is drowned out by the solitude and silence of nature–the music of birds and creatures inhabiting our wheat fields and countrysides and woodlands. Montana is home to the deer and antelope that play, and a few buffalo that still roam, with golden sunsets and flaming orange sunrises and crystal clear lakes and streams.

Montana is also a place where nature dresses in the beauty of four distinct seasons.

Our state is home to the Native American, Asian, European, and Black, wealthy, poor, and everyone in between–a place where all are considered equal in the eyes of the Montanan.

Why do I love Montana? Because this state is a land rich in treasured resources and experiences–and for generations, the love and appreciation for Montana remains in the hearts and homes of its people. MSN