<p>The Smiths pause during packing. Dave works two weeks at a time in North Dakota, then comes home for a week.</p>
December 18, 2011
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December 18, 2011 8:07 p.m.
Couple endures long weeks apart
'Holidays are really hard'
Williston, N.D., is desolate, cold and 563 miles from Kalispell, but the oil boom there has supplied jobs of last resort for hundreds of Flathead Valley breadwinners such as Dave Smith.