Life, Death, and Yellow Perch

One of my earliest memories is the death of my grandfather. My mom walked into my kindergarten class, her face wore so many more masks than usual. I heard her tell my teacher that I had to leave because my grandfather passed away. This was such a confusing time in my life. My parents were newly divorced and living in separate homes and I was trying to navigate the confusion and pain left behind after I was sexually assaulted earlier that year by a friend of the family. I was emotionally numb, the tears had long run out onto my pillows and trusty stuffed animals that kept me company during sleepless nights. I wasn’t close to my grandfather, the only memory that remained was the feeling of his stubbled cheeks as he hugged me when we arrived at their home in Westbrook Maine. I am sometimes paused by the smell of sawdust soaked with machine oil. They smelled of his old brown steel toe shoes that sat in the garage where he would change into house slippers after work. My brother, being 6 years older, was much closer to him. They went on fishing trips and to that old green cabin I barely remember in the woods. I felt like a casual passenger to all the emotions swimming around at my grandparents house that evening. The adults softly chatting at the kitchen table a full amber glass ashtray in the middle. My grandparents room had two beds and there was still a heavy antiseptic aroma left by the hospice apparatuses pushed to the corner. My brother sat alone on the couch, he hadn’t really stopped crying since I got home from school and all through the two hour drive. He had an old knife in his hand that he kept opening and closing over and over again while staring at the carpet. I noticed his fingers were red as he had a deep cut on his thumb. I don’t remember anything after that, no funeral, no visits to the grave site. I am sure we had gone but so much from that era is just blank with a few little events sprinkled around rattling in my brain. I remember sitting on the shore of my favorite pond in Gardner, weeping uncontrollably with a fish in between my feet. It was a yellow perch I had caught moments ago. It had swallowed my worm baited hook, enlodged beyond the gills. I tried to reach in with a pair of forceps my dad had on his fishing vest my mom had made but I couldn’t reach the hook. Blood had started coming through the gills onto my hands covering my fingers. I thought of my brother's sadness, I looked at my dads vest and remembered my mom gifting it to my father for Christmas, that stubbled hug from my grandfather and finally that event in the attic that I kept secret until I was 23 years old. I broke at the shore of that pond. Strangers tried to help and looked around for my father who was jogging from the snack bar with a hot dog for me, a dead yellow perch between my feet, my line still coming from its mouth. I looked at my father and he looked at me knowing all the pain that was simmering behind my eyes. He picked up the fish and washed it off in the water and put it in the waterproof pocket of his vest. When we got home we talked a lot about death, Mr. Rogers had introduced to me the idea of loss but what about when you caused the death. He started a fire in the wood stove and brought me my blanket and tear stained pillow and went to the kitchen. I fell asleep on the floor with my childhood dog and awoke to the smell of dinner. My mom came in with a plate, it took me aback as she had moved to her new apartment about a half mile away. On the plate was the smallest fish filet along with rice and veggies. My dad came in and we all talked about life, death and the journey we all share with nature. That the perch’s life was not wasted. Since those times both of my parents remarried to amazing partners, I have lost all of my grandparents, my parents have turned into grandparents and I lost my Brother over 20 years ago. We may not honor life the same way but those that we have lost feed our present. I wouldn't be the father I am today if I hadn’t witnessed my brother be one first. I find myself thinking about all these memories because my mom has started losing so many of hers, and I feel like I need to reinforce them in my mind to assure that they will feed my own small family as they navigate their own lives.

Smallmouths and saying goodbye

The darkness was still sitting heavy as we drank our coffee on the front porch.  When the bottoms of the cups became visible the sun had started breaking through the horizon, warming the chilled air just enough to vanquish the clouds from our breath.  We were staying at a cabin on Big Lake, a Northern Maine treasure for Bass and beautiful landscapes.  Every morning my step dad and I would take the small motor equipped row boat about three quarters of a mile south to a nice Lily pad field, fed by two small streams bringing loads of bait fish.    The put-put rhythm of the motor pushed us through the early dawn as we watched bald eagles and herons feeding before the rest of the lake woke up.  This area would promise three hours of amazing fishing until the sun would chase the bass deeper into the pads and we would head back for breakfast.  The afternoons would be filled with fishing for large pickerel and white perch from the cabins dock or sometimes we would head out to the local tackle shop and try and find more fire tiger pattern lures which seemed to be the pattern of the week.  Other afternoons would find my mother and I walking through the woods sketching and talking until night crept upon us.  On this final afternoon I decided I needed to go solo and say my goodbyes to the lake.  The sunset was brilliant that night. The whole world turned orange and I decided to pull out the fly rod, it was always with me but since my dad had hung up his waders it rarely made an appearance.  I tied on an old cork popper I bought from an elderly fisherman at a yard sale the year before.  The heat had melted off the rubber legs and the marabou tail had seen better days but there was something about the red and white pattern that called to me.  I made a cast across the stream inlet about twenty five yards and with two twitches of the fly, it sank.  I brought in my first smallmouth bass ever.  I was so surprised by how different they were from their largemouth cousins.  Golds and browns replaced the greens of their bodies and the red eyes were just so striking.  I topped the evening off with a few more of these bronze treasures and headed back as the sun kissed the opposite shore.  By the time I got the motor started and headed to the other side of the lake I realized I had no idea where the cabin was.  Everything on the shore was shaded by trees and the shadows of the looming night.  I kept heading across the water into a black void hoping once I got closer I could find some kind of landmark.  As I began to settle into the idea that this was a true problem I saw, about 50 yards away two pinpoints of light waving back and forth.  As I approached I saw my mom holding two flashlights with a big smile of relief that I had found my way back.  So many amazing memories have been born from fishing, but my mom was always a part of these experiences in her own way.  It has become my role now to keep these memories fresh and share with the world. 

Pumpkinseeds and the Spinner

Worms on hooks, bobbers carefully watched under hot skies bologna sandwich laying in the grass and a metal cantina filled with spring water collected on the way to the pond.  We would spend a few minutes collecting the discarded styrofoam containers from around the ground left behind by the previous fisherman.  I inspected each one to make sure they were empty, we had spent the early evening last night after the rain, collecting nightcrawlers into a metal can but you could never have enough.  I was at the level now where I was prepping the hook and setting the bobber at the proper height and even snapping my own hook and line onto the swivel by myself.  I was kind of a pro at this by now and my stride over to my favorite little fishing spot telegraphed my skills.  I spent the first few hours setting hooks in small perch and sunfish of varying size when my dad approached me with his hands behind his back.  He sat down next to me, the bobber still in my periphery.  He showed me a lure still in the cardboard packaging, a Mepps Aglia.  It consisted of an angular brass body with a treble hook and a buck hair tail.  He went through the basics of fishing these and that I should try on the other side of the little inlet to get out of the weeds a little to make it easier on me.  He spoke about the importance of how fast to reel in the lure that it would change how the spinner would act under the water and how deep it would sink.  I hung that thing up so many times on the bottom of the pond, the frustration was getting to be so much for me to contain.  I tried to keep my professional appearance to all the other “kids” who were still staring at their bobbers, but I wasn’t a lure pro I was still a worm pro fishing out of my lane.  I hung up on the bottom one last time and I sat down waiting for my dad to try and dislodge the spinner from whatever I had snagged.  He couldn’t and when he brought out his buck knife I almost burst into tears as he slid the blade under the fishing line.  I sat there stunned knowing I had failed my first day as a real fisherman.  My dad could feel how much weight I had on my shoulders, he was used to this as I never could take failure well. I wasn’t in the mood to tie on another bobber so we packed up and instead of the normal Fleetwood 8 track that we played all the time in the old chevy he turned the radio off and we talked.  We talked about how learning always included times of what I thought were failures.  He reminded me about learning to ride a bike, the road rashes, bruises, and damaged ego would lead to a skill I used every single day.  Fishing was just like that.  I thought we were heading home but instead we stopped at the local bait shop and he had me pick out three new spinners and that we would go back to the pond and try again.  I picked another Mepps Aglia, and a panther, and some other one that had an insect painted on the wooden body.  When we got back to the pond he stood with me and guided me through the techniques of casting something so light, and how to vary the speed of reeling it in and moving the rod up and down to imitate a darting bait fish.  For the next hour of tough training I only hung up twice.  He sat back down leaning on a tree pipe in mouth, smoke swirling above his felt hat.  I started fishing on my own using all the skills he had taught me and in about a half an hour something took my spinner and it was a lot different than the perch from earlier on in the day.  This was a lure fish, one of those big ones I saw on pictures hanging in the bait shop register wall.  My first was a Pumpkinseed, with its orange belly and almost neon like blue green rays flowing from the eyes down the body.  It was the size of my dads palm and I marveled at its beauty.  The day would be the first of many teachings on the river, not just technique.  It went beyond what color fly to fish on a cloudy spring morning or what color rapala to float across the mouths of largemouth.  I have learned about my resilience, my eagerness to learn everything I could, patience, and to love the now no matter how frustrating or rewarding it can be.  

Bluegills and the way of nature

 I hope everybody has “that moment” in nature that sparks a passion for connection to natural spaces. Maybe you find a piece of quartz in a small pencil line of a brook buried in a forest. Perhaps you’ve had your breath stolen by the majesty and aroma of stand of tall pines. I remember laying on my belly, nose touching the water of a pond in my backyard;  breathing in that sweet mixture of fresh water, algae, and rotting leaves that carpet the bottom. A water strider, inches away, skating on the surface as small rivulets encircling each leg. I watched it dance back and forth on the water, when a bluegill appeared underneath and effortlessly drew it into its open mouth. I was a nature kid, most of us were in that era, not born of passion but of necessity. My parents were of the Hippy generation and the circle of life would come up during every nature hike or picnic at a lake. The story of how life gives back to the Earth would diminish the pain of seeing a dead squirrel or bird to my little empathic heart.  Seeing this teaching in action was the event that would put all of life into perspective for me. It transformed from "we become dirt" to "death enables life." It was a more direct line to the beautiful eventuality that trees will grow from us. Balance. I would look at the natural world through new eyes that would make connections with every living thing. Instead of solely looking at a blue jay for their beauty, I discovered that their way of life is just as important. A mosquito became more than a nuisance as I saw the shadows of bats feasting for hours. Fishing also became a whole different experience; no longer just throwing a worm into the water, I was spellbound by the web of life spun before me. The feeding behavior of the bluegill and the evasive maneuvers of the minnows, and of the insects is what invited me to watch my father fly fishing from a different perspective. As he stood in the water gazing at the surface, and then at his little metal fly box, and then back into the stream, I realized he was also laying on his belly, nose in the water, watching the synchronicity of nature.