I went to Butte for one thing: food.

The building we were in was three stories (two, if you asked the taxman).

First floor: the mercantile — preserved as it was in 1909.

Dried fish.

Drawers labeled “peanuts” and “mushrooms.”

Second floor: the mezzanine — due to its low ceiling, it wasn't considered a true floor (therefore untaxable), so it was rented to accountants and other one-person operations.

Top floor: the noodle shop.

Big woks. A giant icebox. Stains on the floor.

Electric cords dangling over where tables once sat elbow-to-elbow.

My friend and I were at the Mai Wah Museum in Butte, Montana, for a historical food tasting — sampling dishes from cultures usually left out of written history.

But sitting there in the abandoned noodle shop, I couldn’t stop thinking about something else:

The heat.

A light breeze came through the open window.

In 1914, that breeze would’ve been clogged with smelter smoke.

The roar of machinery all along the hill would’ve shaken the walls as the clang and crash of train cars echoed across the valley.

And that’s not even touching on city hygiene.

Sewage and garbage in the streets.

The poorest neighborhood — the Cabbage Patch, just down the road — had an open sewage ditch running through it.

Imagine eating noodles with that in your nose.

But that’s when I realized:

Both history and fiction drop you into a life that isn't yours.

Because whether you’re in a Butte museum or between the pages of a novel, you can almost feel the heat, taste the noodles, and hear the clang of a world outside your own.

Which is incredible — and probably why I love both stories and history so stinkin' much 💞

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