I’ve been fishing twice in my life–once on a lake, another time in the Long Island sound. A long time ago. I don’t recall much other than being bored. Fishing was something kids were supposed to enjoy–like flying a kite or building model airplaines–but I never took to it. Too much patience for a blabbermouth like me. Still, I appreciate why certain men love to fish. Y’all have any good fishing stories?
Also, has anyone read A River Runs Through It by Norman Maclean? I have not, but from what I hear it is a wonderfully written book. Here is an excerpt:
After my brother and I became good fishermen, we realized that our father was not a great fly caster, but he was accurate and stylish and wore a glove on his casting hand. As he buttoned his glove in preparation to giving us a lesson, he would say, “It is an art that is performed on a four-count rhythm between ten and two o’clock.”
As a Scot and a Presbyterian, my father believed that man by nature was a mess and had fallen from an original state of grace. Somehow, I early developed the notion that he had done this by falling from a tree. As for my father, I never knew whether he believed God was a mathematician but he certainly believed God could count and that only by picking up God’s rhythms were we able to regain power and beauty. Unlike many Presbyterians, he often used the word “beautiful.”
After he buttoned his glove, he would hold his rod straight out in front of him, where it trembled with the beating of his heart. Although it was eight and a half feet long, it weighed only four and a half ounces. It was made of split bamboo cane from the far-off Bay of Tonkin. It was wrapped with red and blue silk thread, and the wrappings were carefully spaced to make the delicate rod powerful but not so stiff it could not tremble.
I'm not much of a fisherman either, Alex. As a matter of fact, my fondest fishing memory from my childhood is the day my mother took my brother and me to a local pond. While they fished, I sat on a large rock near a small stream and read the "The Bronx Zoo". While they were drowning worms out in the hot sun, I was relaxing in the shade reading about my favorite baseball team. It has to rank as one of the best days of my childhood (although, I could have done without the visual of Sparky Lyle sitting naked on a cake... ;-)
I bought a boat last year for the sole purpose of being able to take my son out every weekend in the summer for some quality father/son time. He's in peewee baseball and other sports but it's not the same. Spending time in Gloucester Harbor (we live in Massachusetts) just being guys can't be beat. We bait the hook, drop the line overboard, and then we hang out and chat, look at the scenes, etc. It's rare to get a 6 year old's undivided attention but he's got nothing else to do on the boat other than talk to me. If the fish aren't biting, we head for the shallows and catch crabs for him to play with. You can almost always catch a skate or dogfish (which is a kind of shark with no teeth that will "bite" on anything you throw in the water). He doesn't care if it's junk fish - only that he's spending time with me and getting my undivided attention for a few hours. When we release the fish there are many teaching opportunities, and when we keep the good ones for dinner, there are teaching opportunities there too. If you're not much of a fisherman but want to try with your kids, I highly recommend chartering a boat in the ocean. The fish in the ocean are bigger and generally easier to catch than the ones in lakes and rivers.
I love fishing--for me the downing of worms [1] IS the relaxation. Anymore, I don't care if I catch anything--I just like to sit by the water and think. It's a perfect time and place to be removed from society for a bit--a sort of temporary monasticism.
In my younger days I not infrequently combined my two great loves: fishing and baseball. Many a time I slipped down the road (we lived in the country) and went fishing on a summer evening, while listening to the Yankees game on the radio. or, my brother and I would would go fishing together, and when the action slowed the topic of baseball invariably sped up.
I don't get to fish too often any more--it's been a few years now, anyway. I also don't get the chance to attend as many ball games as I used to (that includes MiL). From my perspective, though, sitting by the lake staring at the water and sitting in the stands staring at a 'meaningless' game, quietly, are both similar and highly enjoyable.
A friend of my father has a boat, we head out to Jamaica Bay every so often, looking for stripers and blues. We'll catch bunkers for bait. My uncle has a place in SC that has a river running in the back of the property. We'll spend time looking for catfish and crabs.
It's fun spending time, idle chatter with the old man (or old men, if my uncles are involved)
I am not a fisherman but love the woods. As such I interact a lot with fisher folks and I have a great appreciation for it. These folks also tend to love the woods. So we have that in common. :)
I have a vivid memory of fishing a pond at the local park in northern NJ with my brother and his friends when I was probably 10 or so. Anyhow, I caught a sunny and I hooted like I caught a whale. I was made fun of for some time for my overjubelance!
[0] you've been fishing two more times than i ever have! i've been camping exactly as many times as i've been fishing = nunce! : )
Well, finally a non baseball post that I feel qualified to reply to, lol. I was gonna jump in on the pizza one (Joe's Pizza in Whitesboro - hands down best pizza on the planet), but I figured I'd be far outnumbered by the NYC crew.
I've been a fly fisherman for a couple decades now - before the book you referenced was turned into "The Movie". For awhile, anglers were divided into two camps - "pre movie" and "newbies", sorta like how Yankee fans are "pre-1996" and "spoiled brats", lol.
There are few things more satisfying and enjoyable than spending a day on a trout stream, casting a dry fly in the hopes of raising a fish. It's not hooking or catching the fish that is the draw - it's the whole deal. The stuff. The preparation. The long winter of waiting. The anticipation the night before a trip. The excitement when stepping into the river. The adrenaline rush of the first strike The good feeling at the end of the day of being bone tired from physical activity (unlike the tired from mental burnout after a day of work). The comforting weight of you favorite vest. The box of well tied flies. The sound of the water in a gentle riffle. The grace of the cast. The escape from life for a little while.
Not much better.
A big can of Yankee whoop ass unleashed on the Sox tonight would be darn close.
Just a quick addendum. My kids like to tease me about "that fly fishing movie" (A River Runs Through It), but the central story to both the book and the movie is the relationship between the brothers, and between the boys and their father. Sure, there is a bit of fishing in the story, but you don't need to be a fisherman to read the book or see the movie.
Yeah - the book is extraordinarily well written. MacLean had a gift for words, no doubt. It's quite a story. Alex - you're a guy of varied interests. Check it out and let us know what you think. It's a short book - an afternoon read - but it will leave an impression. I'd be interested in yours.
(The movie is good, too, even with Brad Pitt).
if Wang's wife has a baby - and she very well may - who pitches? Hughes?!
i'll miss most of the game again due to teaching. everybody Wang Chung tonight! : )
Jeter SS
Damon LF
Teixeira 1B
Rodriguez 3B
Cano 2B
Posada C
Matsui DH
Swisher RF
Cabrera CF
Wait .... Wang has a wife .... weally?
(Not a drawing on paper?..... cause then she would be about to become an Origami Mommy) :-)
(yeah, I know Wang is from China and Origami is from Japan .... but work with me here)
I love fishing. I grew up fishing, though it was mostly in the ocean, not freshwater. Almost every day after school, I would go fishing with my sister and my cousins. No worms. We used fish or shrimp as bait, or artificial lures. Strips cut from latex gloves were surprisingly effective. We used hand-held nets, bamboo poles, or traps when we were little, and graduated to rods and reels as we got older. In the summer, we'd get up at the crack of dawn (fish were rumored to bite more then), and spend the whole day fishing.
That's one thing I noticed about Florida, when I went down there for spring training. People love to fish, anywhere and everywhere. If a bridge isn't posted "No fishing," someone will be fishing from it. It reminded me of my hometown (which is on the other side of the country, but similarly fishing-obsessed). Black, white, Asian, Hispanic, seniors in wheel chairs, families with small kids, teenagers, nuns in dresses and veils - all fishing side by side.
I never came across any baseball players fishing, though I know a lot of them do it. This pic from the wire services a couple of years ago cracks me up. Former Yankee Bubba Crosby went fishing...in his baseball uniform. (Apparently, the water was right by one of the spring training practice fields. That's Ryan Freel with him. He did catch a fish.)
I come from a long line (pun intended) of commercial fishermen, Alex! My great-great grandfather, great grandfather, grandfather, father, uncles, cousins, and me [I worked on the ships (120 foot trawlers) in the summers for a handful of years as a teenager while growing up.], spent all sorts of durations of time at sea, from one day to a week, hunting the North Atlantic fishing routes for schools of tuna, haddock, pollock, and cod. Many of the men in my family did that for decades off the coast of Provincetown, MA. I know about lobster and crab trapping, clam digging, harvesting oysters and scallops, and have enjoyed more than my fair share of fresh octopus and squid soup, fish stews and chowders over the years, traditional clam bakes, too. You simply have not lived until you haul in a 300-pound net-busting tuna. Talk about a strong critter! He was pure muscle and power, the biggest I ever saw at eight feet long and at least a yard fat with eyes the size of my fist! One of those would go for about $10-$15K in Japan these days I believe! Good times! This was before the modern commercial fishing industry all but overfished many species out in the North Atlantic.
Collectively, my relatives did more than enough fishing for me. It wasn't the hard work that scared me as much as losing two cousins to rough seas. That's probably why I learned to swim very early on as well.
Because of my fishing background, I know how to pick the better critters from tanks and the ice cases at the fishmonger's, too. Never pick a lobster whose shell is soft behind its claws where you pick it up. That means it has recently molted and is full of water taking much of the taste from the meat from around the rest of the body. Instead, choose the ones that are harder and barely give to a squeeze. They have more meat and taste better, too. Look for clear eyes on fish, and you should smell nothing when taking a sniff. If you smell any type of "fishy scent," don't buy it. Also, with respect to clams, scallops and mussels make sure they are either closed, they can close their shell by tapping on them, or else they are dead. You can get a serious case of food poisoning eating dead bivalve mollusks.
"The Deadliest Catch" has got nothing on me! I've been in a couple of storms worth of "high seas" before with 20-foot faces crashing the topside. The waters weren't icy though, as I fished during the warmer summers in those days.
I've been angling at least a dozen times off the coast of Florida too, catching Marlin, Dolphin Fish, Sailfish, Sharks, Tuna, King Mackerel, Swordfish, Grouper, Snapper, and Eels on much smaller charter boats, frog giggin' in the Everglades on an air boat, and caught small and large mouth bass, crappie, and crawdads in the lake we live close to these days. I've even caught flounder, and plaice, with dough on a hook too, 30 in two hours once, in fact! I have never caught an Alligator, but I have helped the wildlife and forestry folks take several "bigguns" from off golf courses where I worked in Florida. They have to be removed and taken to the Everglades when they grow larger than eight feet, at least that's the way it used to be. I also have two seven-month-old koi in a tank right next to me as I type this! They are about five inches long now and getting fatter by the second! Their names are Sushi and Hand Roll.
Needless to add, Fishing, salty seawater, and freshwater are all in my blood! I love the sea and all bodies of water. I even love hitting golf balls over and astride them too, and the two courses I play here most often have nine holes that run along the Cumberland River!
Ahoy! You land lubbers really must get out more often! The catch of the day is waiting!
: )
A River Runs Through It is a gorgeous book, exquisitely written, reserved in its emotions, and passionate in reader response. And, it's very short.