Los siete magníficos

Charlie Russell painting (title forthcoming)

I have a high school reunion of sorts coming up this summer. I'm not sure I want to start writing about it yet. My high school experience was not as awful as it could have been. Or even very awful period. But I can't help wondering what it would have been like to attend CMR High in Great Falls, MT. C.M.R. stands for Charles Marion Russell, author of the above work of art and my favorite Western artist. His paintings and sculptures show how it is and how it was around the landscapes surrounding one of my favorite Montana towns. But back to CMR. Their fight song is the the theme from The Magnificent Seven. How cool is that? And how cool would you feel if you were on a sports team and did your little warm-up laps to this?




I bought the song on iTunes this weekend (along with the theme from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly).Before leaving work I copied it onto a CD with some other recently acquired gems. It came on as I drove through one of the few patches of open spaces and immediately evoked round-up images like the one above and its modern version (which occurs somewhere near Roundup, if I'm not mistaken ;) ). When hearing something like this, no matter who or where you are, you just can't help but ride drive sitting up a little taller and straighter in the saddle driver's seat.