A Fishing Story
In a previous post, I credited my dad for instilling my love of trout, but without my mother, I may have never survived some of my earliest trout fishing trips. I likely would have died of hypothermia or been swept away by swift currents had I been left alone with my father. When he got to the trout stream, he fell into an unbreakable trance. It was as if he was communicating with the trout, urging them to come out of hiding and feed on the handfuls of canned corn he would mindlessly toss upstream. “You gotta chum ’em up.” I shudder to think how many stocked trout fell victim to affixation from genetically modified kernels of Jolly Green Giant brand corn.
In my earliest trout fishing trips, I always seemed to end up with my mother. She, too, was quite proficient at slinging corn for stocked trout. With a more patient approach than my father, she didn’t move around the stream as much (or chum). Picking her spots carefully and methodically working a section of water, she would often out fish the men who begrudgingly looked on from the next hole down.
But unlike my father, who would let me cry on the bank and fend for myself, my mother took the time to untangle my line or walk me back to the car to get dry clothes after I inevitably fell in. If not for her patience and foresight, I may never have become an angler.
My Father Left Us Behind
One of my earliest fishing memories was the day my father put off saving my mother’s life because he was sure there was a brown trout at the end of the run he was fishing. Shortly after arriving at our local put and take stream, my father hastily put on his gear and hurried downstream to get to his favorite hole. He owned that hole, and he was not about to let some local worm slinger beat him to it. My mother and I were left to fish the section of stream closest to the car. Before she and I even put on our boots, my father was off.
A Sign of What Was to Come
I focused in on my father’s fishing net as he disappeared into the brush. Watching the net become entangled in every sticker bush he passed, I studied the thin elastic cord linking the net to his tattered K-Mart fishing vest. Not recognizing this as a sign of what was to come, I waited for the elastic cord to fail but it never did.
Like Lewis and Clark, my father forged ahead with great determination. Each time the net became entangled in a sticker bush, the elastic cord stretched to the verge of its breaking point. Just when I thought the cord could take no more, the net would snap back at the speed of sound, striking my father in the back of the head. Any mortal man would have sustained a concussion from such an impact, but not my father. He had a trout to catch.
Pennsylvania “Quicksand”
Soon after my father was out of sight, my mother and I embarked on a short journey to our designated fishing spot. Along the way, we discovered a hidden danger that would keep us from ever fishing that day, and ultimately, the rest of trout season.
We noticed the ground below us becoming softer as we approached the stream. The tall grass and riparian buffer concealed the mud in which we would soon find ourselves to be trapped. My mother began to sink into the mud. Her rubber, knee-high boots quickly became enveloped into an inescapable vacuum. The harder she pulled one leg, the deeper the other would sink.
The Incredible Hulk Didn’t Help
Normally, getting stuck in mud would not seem terrifying, but the night before our family had watched an episode of The Incredible Hulk when he got stuck in quicksand.
We chuckled at the absurdity of the Hulk being saved by a feeble tree branch. But now, this was all becoming a reality, as my mother dramatically gripped onto a nearby sapling for dear life. Like the elastic band connecting my father’s fishing net to his vest, I thought that little tree would never withstand the pressure it was now under.
“Jeffrey, go get your father. I’m sinking. Tell him to hurry,” my mother cried.
Choosing a Brown Trout Over Love
Somehow I had escaped the quagmire of death and raced through the same brush my father had trampled down on the way to his favorite hole. When I spotted him, he was standing in the middle of the stream, putting corn on his hook and discarding the extra kernels into the current.
“Dad! Come quick. Mom’s stuck in quicksand. She can’t get out.”
While my mother was desperately clinging to her only connection to solid land, my father burst into hysterical laughter. Despite my urging to rescue my poor mother, my dad continued to fish for that brown trout. “Hold on,” he said, “I’m getting a hit. There’s a brownie at the end of this run.”
Exasperated, I pleaded with him to hurry. By now, she was surely up to her neck, just moments away from her doom. Missing on multiple casts for that brown trout, my father finally relented and followed me back to Jurassic tarpit. Thankfully, just like the Hulk, my mother was still clutching to that tree, reliving the horror we had witnessed the night before in the comfort of our living room.
The Heroic Rescue
“Raymond, it’s not funny!” she exclaimed, getting angrier by the minute. Before my own eyes, my mother had become Bill Bixby. I thought she may transform into the Hulk. My father had really done it this time. I tried to warn him, “Dad, you wouldn’t like mom when she’s angry.”
Half laughing and still thinking about that brown trout, my dad began to help my mother and kept her from being sucked into Middle Earth. During the heroic rescue attempt, she became separated from one of her boots. She was left with nothing but a cold, wet sock. That boot likely remains deep in the same mud today. Archaeologists will, no doubt, discover it thousands of years from now and debate its origins. They will ponder whether its owner survived such a harrowing experience.
An Early End to Trout Season and Almost a Marriage.
What the archaeologists won’t ever know is that my father was the one who almost didn’t survive that day. Though my mother was safely on solid ground, our evening of fishing was over before it started. Watching my mother hobble back to the car with only one boot gave me a sinking feeling trout season was over for the year, as I guessed it would take her until the start of the next trout season to forgive my father.
I had never seen her so angry. She didn’t transform into the Hulk as I feared, but we never did made it back out to the trout stream that year. I think even my father learned a valuable lesson that day. Never choose trout fishing over love.
Thanks for reading! Spend more time on the water!
Have a great day!
Jeff Smecker*Make sure to leave a comment below!
