R.O.I

JASPER NATIONAL PARK, ALBERTA-2026

Lost a hundred dollars on a hockey bet at the De'd Dog bar in Jasper. Tampa Bay Lightning versus Montreal Canadiens.

I'd been saddled up at the red pool table playing 9 ball with a group of Canadians, locals both my age and older. Said I was from Bozeman. They singled me out immediately as the dumb American and spent the better part of the evening proving their point in a verbal beatdown that was eleven against one and honestly not going well for me because even I have to admit the US is not currently in its finest hour. Then the hockey game came on and I decided the smart move was to bet on Tampa because they were the American team and I had something to prove. They pooled together a hundred Canadian dollars. I had to go to the ATM. Boy was I going to show them something. I've never watched hockey.

Montreal won. I hadn't even been paying attention until the cheers started. I swiveled on my heel to look at the results. My smile dropped like a rock. One of them walked over and held out his hand. I just gave him the money while still staring at the TV without saying a word. Lost the 9 ball too.

Walked back to Wapiti Campground alone. Forty five minutes through a Jasper that was alive, locals out in force getting the partying done before tourist season arrived and ruined everything. I crossed the street to avoid any more conversation. Thinking about a hundred dollars and too much misplaced pride in a country that was making itself difficult to defend.

Django was in the bed of the truck working through his dinner with the focused energy of someone who had completely moved on from the evening's events and was not interested in a debrief. The audacity.

The campsite next to mine had a camper van and two women from somewhere, and their black lab apparently decided that Django was the most interesting development in the area and came sprinting over like he'd been personally invited. Django accepted this with the dignity of a young man who expects nothing less.

One of the women came over to collect her dog, took one look at me sitting in the dirt next to my truck still processing the hockey situation, and invited me back to their camp.

Four camp chairs. Two for them. Two for their dogs. They did not offer me one. They gave Django one. He sat in it like he owned it because he did.

One of the women quietly got down off her chair and sat on the ground with me without making a production of it, which was either an act of solidarity or a practical acknowledgment that the ground was where I belonged tonight. Two labs and her wife looked down at me from their elevated positions. The dogs were the clear ruling class of this campsite and everyone, including me, had accepted the social contract.

The vibe was stoic. Matter of fact. Mostly quiet.

I broke the silence.

"Where y'all from?"

The y'all gave me away before they even answered.

"Saskatoon."

"Oh, I hear that's nice."

"Nope. And you?"

"Well. I'm from Vancouver."

They just looked at me for a moment with the specific patience of people who had heard worse lies told less confidently.

"Nope. Want a beer?"

Geopolitical tensions between Canada and the US being what they were, announcing yourself as American felt like unnecessary paperwork after the evening I'd had. They knew immediately. Said absolutely nothing about it. Just handed over a Pacifico and moved on, which is the most Canadian possible response to a transparent lie told by a man sitting in the dirt next to his dog, who was in a chair.

Woke up at 7 a.m. on four hours of sleep that felt like two. They took one look at me standing outside my tent in the disheveled state I presented to the world and invited me into the camper van anyway, which said something either about their generosity or their standards, and I wasn't going to ask which.

Drove out toward the mudflats between Jasper and Hinton. The time of year when they hadn't yet become a lake. Headed northwest. Three humans and three canines crossing toward the mountains rising out of the opposite side of the valley. Django tied to me. Their labs off leash in direct violation of Parks Canada regulations, which nobody acknowledged and nobody was going to.

We didn't talk much. Some mornings don't need it.

Four hours round trip. Finding a mature bighorn ram is a gamble you don't need to go to Vegas for. You put in the work and hope the work pays out.

One of them clicked like she was calling a horse and pointed at a ridge. A group of bighorn moving up a cliff face. The ram at the back turned and looked at us.

Confused. Genuinely confused. Like he had no frame of reference for what he was looking at. Some bleary eyed creature who'd lost a hundred dollars on a sport he'd never watched, gotten verbally dismantled by eleven Canadians, and gotten invited on a hike by two women who gave their dogs better seating than him.

I recognized the expression immediately. I'd had it when Tampa lost.

They gave me another beer when we found him.

Two beers. Hundred dollars lost on hockey. They made each beer worth fifty dollars.

But hey, I got the shot.

That's R.O.I.