Now, with both of them having year-round jobs here at The Resort, they are leaving behind nearly a decade of a nomadic work life. As Ted put it, “We flunked retirement. We retired but kept working.” The highlight of their work camping experience was four seasons at Yellowstone. Reflecting on their time there, Ted said, “We had the biggest backyard in the world and I did not have to weed it and I did not have to mow it.” They also had two seasons near Glacier National Park, but that one was too remote for Anita – “it was 140 miles to buy groceries.”
Before they started work camping in 2009, both had lengthy traditional careers. Although both are from Montana, they retired in Seattle. Ted had taken a company move there, doing route sales: “I called on grocery stores and convenience stores – potato chips, bread, cookies – and at one point I was a service tech for Boyd Coffee.” Anita retired from one of Seattle’s high-tech companies.
As for the Montana connection, both were born there and the two met while attending Carrol College in Helena, a Catholic College, with the nickname of Fighting Saints, although the mascot is a dog, a Saint Bernard named Halo. (Fun fact: St Bernard dogs are not named for the Catholic saint, but rather, for the Great St. Bernard Pass, the treacherous 49-mile trek from Italy to Switzerland. The dogs were used by monks to assist travelers through the snowy pass and came to fame leading Napoleon’s troops, sparing them from what the soldiers called “the White Death.’)
