The stories behind Montana - Big Sky Biomed

• Big Sky Biomed: Two Hundred Miles Till the Work Gets Done — “Big Sky Biomed” follows a technician driving two hundred miles to fix a blood analyzer at a rural Montana clinic that has never had a visitor quite like him.

Lyrics

The service light came on before the sun

Two hundred miles till the work gets done

A toolbox rattled by the passenger door

And a paper map spread across the floor

The clinic called from a town I'd never seen

Said the old blood analyzer quit its screen

Montana,

hold your blue above this road I'm carrying a heartbeat where

the cold winds blow Past the ranch gates, past the granite line I'll bring that

little machine back to life tonight

Under the big sky, every mile means more

When a rural clinic is waiting at the door

A cattle guard rang like a distant bell

Snowmelt ran beside the road through sagebrush swells

A rancher waved from a weathered gate

Said, you're the man they've been hoping wouldn't be late

And the backroom nurse has kept the lights on

With a child's red mitten hanging by the cold room door

Montana,

hold your blue above this road I'm carrying a heartbeat where

the cold winds blow

Past the ranch gates, past the granite line I'll bring that little machine back

to life tonight Under the big sky, every mile means more

When a rural clinic is waiting

at the door.

I found a loose connection, cleaned the dust away,

the screen blank green like the start of day.

A quiet cheer rose up beside the bed and the mountain wind

moved through the cedar shed.

Montana, lay your stars along the road. I'm heading home

Lighter than the load I brought

Past the ranch lights

Past the timber line

There's a working heart

In that clinic tonight under the big sky

Every mile means more

When a rural planet can keep its people close

The toolbox rests,

the eastern horizon moves

Montana keeps the road and the road returns