Jack is a name that congers up a multitude of expressions: Jack of all trades; Jackass; Jack o’ lantern; Jackrabbit; Jackpot; Hit the road, Jack; and many more. Research suggests that Jack was originally a nickname for John, a biblical name sourced in deep Hebrew history. Jack became a common nickname in the late Middle Ages. It’s often meant to suggest an ordinary guy. The following describes two brief encounters, a convergence of three ordinary guys: two Jacks and a Ted.
I met Old Jack at a Bureau of Land Management recreation site along the upper Green River drainage about 20 miles west of Pinedale, Wyoming. We had both camping there. I was about to leave when I saw Jack walking along the loop road near my site. We both waved. He then walked over to my site like someone who wanted to schmooze for a few minutes, or maybe even an hour. We shook hands, and I could tell that Jack had an ebullient and friendly personality. He was in his mid-sixties, short and slender, graying hair, a week’s worth of stubble, an untrimmed mustache.
We immediately started chatting about our campers. He was clearly a minimalist and could see I was one too. I had noticed his camping vehicle earlier that day, a vintage Toyota RAV 4 from the late 1980s parked a few sites away. At first, I wondered why he hadn’t pitched a tent, but soon realized he was sleeping in his tiny vehicle. He said he had purchased it a few years earlier for $350 from the daughter of an old friend with dementia who could no longer drive. The daughter had initially planned to sell it to a scrap dealer for $300 but Jack intervened with the higher offer. The vehicle had 120,000 miles on it at the time but was in excellent condition. Since then, he had driven it an additional 50,000 miles. He had removed all the seats but the driver’s and built a platform for his air mattress and sleeping bag. He stowed his food, camping gear, and clothes in plastic bins and managed to squeeze out six feet of sleeping space on the passenger side. Jack was a full- timer and roamer after living in Hawaii for much of his career as a general contractor.
We toured my Subaru Forester. It was much newer and larger than his RAV 4, but we both agreed we had a similar sleeping arrangement. We shared some minimalist camping experiences. He had just left Craters of the Moon National Monument in Idaho and was headed to Niagara Falls to visit relatives. I told him I was headed to Montana to do some fishing. We wished each other the best of luck before I left the campground.
A day later, I reached Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge in the Centennial Valley in southwestern Montana to observe trumpeter swans, an endangered bird now commonly seen in marshes and lakes of North America. Only a few breeding pairs remained in the early 20th century when protection programs began. Red Rock Lakes NWR was established in 1935 by Franklin Roosevelt to protect the Trumpeter swan and other wildlife, and to preserve an endangered wetland habitat in a remote Montana valley. Historically, the Centennial Valley has been an important nesting and migration habitat for the swans.
That’s where I met Young Jack. He pulled into the lower lake campground at the NWR in his recent-model Toyota RAV4 near my site and looked around. He had the appearance of someone who was new to Red Rock Lakes. It was late in the afternoon and warm. The current weather forecast indicated showers were likely. Jack walked the short distance to my site and introduced himself. He was tall with straight brown hair over his ears and strikingly handsome. He was also inquisitive and asked several questions. He was passing through the valley headed to West Yellowstone for a music gig. He played guitar and piano and had a job for the weekend there.
I mentioned I was at Red Rocks to check on the Trumpeters. He was unaware of the birds and seemed quite interested when I identified them as rare and recently endangered. I pointed out a breeding pair with a single cygnet on the lower lake and handed him my binoculars. Young Jack was impressed. We speculated on why there was only one cygnet and both agreed that predators might have been responsible.
The Trumpeters got us started on various other topics. Jack said that he had temporarily dropped out of college in Bozeman during Covid and made good money playing popular bars throughout the region. He planned to finish his degree in psychology and start a clinical career. I then described my life in geology, my love of the outdoors, and the difficulty finding good jobs today. When I asked him about his most passionate interest, he immediately said music. He loved what he did but realized he needed a job-oriented degree. He described this with a hint of underlying sadness. I suggested that music could always be a secondary career.
The conversation then morphed into a discussion of fishing. Young Jack said he was a devoted fly fisherman. He knew all the famous western Montana rivers and streams. He asked if I did any mousing, a technique by which an angler deploys an artificial mouse lure to mimic the movements of a swimming mouse. I said I was unaware of mousing, but mentioned I was on my way to meet my son, Ken, in Bozeman, and we were headed to the Gallatin River and the Taylor Fork of the Gallatin south of Bozeman. I added that we rent US Forest Service cabins near trout streams. In a short burst of enthusiasm, I explained that we use night crawlers and keeping our catch to prepare a family recipe called Crispy Fish. I even showed Young Jack a few photos from previous years, of skillets on open fires full of frying trout steaks. Young Jack initially frowned most likely because of his catch-and-release dry fly mentality, but his frown soon morphed into a wide smile. We both suddenly realized we were enjoying nature in our own way. I wished Young Jack the best as he headed back to his vehicle for his drive to West Yellowstone and his music gig.
