Gone Fishin

Gone Fishin’

I once lived in the Great Frozen Nation and there were many lakes at my disposal.  Fifteen minutes from where I lived I could be on a lake wetting a line.  Most times it was what a friend and I referred to as “practice casting”.  “That’s why they call it fishing, not catching” as the old saying goes.  

Fishing is always best if it is a shared experience, whether it is a friend, son, daughter, wife or brother.  My brother, father, and I made it out from time to time and that was a lot of fun.  I really enjoyed going out with my brother because we could revert back to our childhood and do foolish things that I suspect might not have been terribly amusing to dad.

We would head out for Lake Five where we could rent a boat – the crossroads bar was near the lake too – excellent sandwiches and the beer was always biting even if the fish weren’t.   It wasn’t a huge lake, but it was good sized – big enough to have some respectable pike, good sized bass, and various other game fish.  I had heard it was deep enough you could even fish for Walleye there, though I never went after that fish in particular. In fact, “what we were after” was often dictated by what we’d already caught.  If there were several bass on the stringer then apparently we were after bass.  I think that perhaps the actual fishing took somewhat of a back seat to the socializing.  Without dad in the boat, we could make noise without admonishment about scaring off the fish. Looking back at our usual luck I suspect dad was probably right, but all fish and no screwing around makes Phos a dull boy.    

On one expedition, I caught my favorite lure in a tree.  My brother decided he could get it down by standing on the gunwales of the boat and swinging an oar over his head, thereby knocking it out of the tree.  Now, there was beer involved so it seemed like a good plan, right up until his oar swinging nearly tipped the boat.  We did ship about ten gallons of water which promptly filled the stern of the boat.  When we got it back to the dock the boat rental man said “looks like she’s leaking a bit, I better pull ‘er up and have a look”.  Who were we to disagree?  

Fall was the best for fishing, as far as I was concerned.  Bright gold and red rimming the lakes and herons fishing along with us as honking geese flew overhead. There was a snap to the air and it just smelled like fall.  I do not know as the fishing was any better, but the splendor of a Wisconsin Fall was well worth the trip. Even the water seemed thicker, an illusion I suppose, but you could tell that it wouldn’t be long before we’d be walking over the lake.

We did try ice fishing when we were young. Bought some wax worms at the bait store and hiked all the way back.  We’d commandeer an abandoned hole and rigged a line with a well hooked worm.  Didn’t do much beyond drown the worm, but it was fun and I am sure our parents were happy it kept my brother and me out of their hair.  I am sure the rangers were happy because we weren’t testing Einstein’s theory of sinking phone handsets.   Those things are made of plastic so you’d figure they’d float, but Einstein nailed this one, they sink like a rock - even if you tear ‘em apart first.  Go figure.

Spring fishing, once the season opened was ok too.  It wasn’t as pretty as fall, but sometimes it was just as cold.  I remember ice forming on the line as I reeled it in one early spring.  The tree braches had a decidedly fuzzy look to them as they started budding out, later in the spring birds scrambled to set up their territories and you could hear the various calls echoing through the woods along the shore.  The best thing about early Spring or mid to late Fall is you didn’t have to worry about being eaten alive by deer flies, horse files, and mosquitoes.  The only blessing in summer is that we were to far South for black flies.    

I guess people fish in Arizona, but with so few lakes I expect it is like the housing developments where you are cheek to jowl.  I do like people, by and large, but there are times when I feel possessive – this is my lake, my leaves, my time to relax without the noise and rushing and someone trying to climb into my back pocket.  No I will give it a pass here and just look back through the vivid images and feelings ingrained in my soul.