I do not remember the first time I went fishing. I know that I must have enjoyed the experience because fishing has become a rather important part of my life. I remember being young, too young to be left alone around open water, and fishing from my dock for sunfish with my father. I remember the pride that went with each catch I made and the frustration my father displayed with every spool of knotted line I miraculously created with the expertise that only a very young amateur angler possessed. I knew; however, that no matter how many times my father had to untangle my line that he would keep doing so just to see me jump up and down with excitement as I caught another fish.
I grew older and my father began to take me fishing for bass. We would go out onto the lake in his boat and troll along the shore of Long Island. We crossed the channel by Little Bear Island, continue along Dow Island to the rock pit that was just south of Morrison Cove, over the sand flats to the north of Morrison Cove, and we would finish by trolling along Watson Shore until we were home. My mother stayed behind at the cottage but insisted that I wear my life jacket, but as soon as we were out of sight, my father let me take it off probably so he did have to listen to me whine about wearing it. We never talked much during these expeditions, although I asked enough questions to cause convulsions in people who had less patience than my father did. No matter what question I asked about fishing my father always gave my the same answer, “Maybe if you be quiet you won’t scare the fish away.”
My father always took me fishing after dinner. It was quiet and calm on the lake this time of day, which is good for catching bass. The summer sun would slowly set as he passed knowledge on to me about the ways of the bass. The bass are in the rocks and the bass are in the weeds, but weeds are also in the weeds and the weeds can be caught too. Over the flat sandy deeper spots, are where the white fish live and we do not like the white fish, they taste like cat food. I learned that if what you are doing is not catching fish to try something different. Most importantly, I learned to use a red and white feather for a lure. Red makes the bass mad and a mad fish is more likely to bite your line.
My father and I would always catch fish and bring them home. He would clean them and I would watch. I would bring outside to the base of a tree by our driveway the guts of the fish for the raccoon to feast on later that night. The next night my father would cook the fish, with a little flour and butter in an old cast iron skillet that his mother used. We would eat the fish, clean the dishes and head back out onto the lake. I of course had my life jacket on.
One Christmas eve my cousin Larry gave the most wonderful present to my father, a red and white feather that he hand-tied himself. This feather became the stuff of legends. Whoever used this feather would out fish anyone else in the boat by catching twice as many fish that were twice as big as other fish. My father, being the man he was, of course let me use it, and I of course would let him have it back every once in awhile. It did not matter how many copies of this feather my father and I attempted to make, no other lure not even another red and white feather would work like the one my cousin tied for my father.
This feather worked not only for catching bass but I also caught my first Landlocked Salmon with this lure when I was eleven. I caught three salmon that trip while my father caught none and yet he never asked to use the feather. Salmon fishing was much better than bass fishing. The salmon were much stronger and a better looking fish than even the smallmouth bass. When a salmon would jump it was almost like a mirror coming out of the lake that would reflect the sunlight into my eyes. It was then that my father, without words, passed onto me the knowledge that salmon fishing is far more rewarding that bass fishing.
Soon the warmer weather arrived and with that, the salmon retreated to the colder deeper water and my father and I returned to bass fishing. I was not ready to forget the valiant fight of the noble salmon that I had caught earlier that spring but with the red and white feather my cousin had tied for my father the bass just kept on biting. The bass fought well and they fought hard but they were not salmon.
This summer we found bass that were large and rather strong in the rock pit by Morrison cove. It was my job to climb up on the bow as Billy Ray Jr. did in On Golden Pond and look for big rocks so we did not hit them with the boat. When we made it through the bigger rocks, I would climb down and look over the gunwale of the boat and stare at the boulders that the glaciers had put there many millennia ago. The size of the rocks amazed me. I stared into the water and dropped my fishing rod right over the side of the boat.
I remember the feeling of dread that consumed my whole body, as I had to turn around and tell my father what I had just done. I felt upset not because I had just dropped a rod and reel into the lake but because tied onto my line was the red and white feather. My father tried to calm me down and let me know that it was OK, that he had dropped rods into the lake himself. His efforts did not help much. I knew that THE feather was gone forever and it was entirely my fault.
The years of fishing after the rod-dropping incident were still good but my father and I did not catch fish the way we used to. The bass fishing was still good but the salmon fishing was non-existent. My father and I were cursed. We could fish for salmon in the same boat using the same rods, reels, line and lures as everyone else and we would catch nothing while we watch everyone else having fun catching salmon.
Even though my father and I never caught fish the way we used to when we had that old red and white feather, we still went fishing together and he still somehow managed to tell stories in his own unique way. I learned about my uncle Wally trolling with copper line and how my grandfather once drowned a horned pout trying to fish for salmon during the summer in the colder deeper water. I heard stories of Black Horse Ale and learned how to use a Buick to roll logs down a hill. Most importantly, I learned, in the silence of the evening, that my father and I could talk to each other without ever having to say a word. All things must come to end as surely as the sun will set on that lake casting its golden glow across the water as the loon begins its lonely song.
I was twenty-seven years old when my father died. The following spring I had the difficult task of opening the cottage without him. I managed all right, as I pictured him there smoking his cigar, drinking a Coors Light and telling me to be quiet so he can think. I put the boat in the water and headed out onto the lake in search of salmon yet again. I trolled in the waters my father and I always hunted salmon in, the same waters where for the last sixteen years neither my father nor I had caught a single salmon.
I drank my beer and stared off into the sun as I tried to picture my father next to me in his boat. I tried to imagine that I could smell his cigar in the wind. I could almost hear him talking to himself begging, pleading for a fish to bite. Right then, right at that single moment in time my rod doubled over in its rod holder! I jumped up in the boat, grabbed the rod and began the fight.
I fought that fish as carefully as I knew how. I fought that fish just the way my father had taught me. I kept my line tight, and let the fish run when it wanted to run. I eventually got the fish to the boat and into the net. There in my father’s boat, the boat he taught me to fish in was a salmon, the fish that had eluded my father and I for so long. I measured the Salmon at just over twenty inches, five more inches than needed to be legal. I held the fish up staring in wonderment at it while planning how I was going to cook it. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my father sitting in the captain’s chair smiling that proud smile he wore on his face when his young son used to catch sunfish on the dock using nothing more than worms as bait. I saw my father smiling proudly because here in his boat after sixteen years his son finally caught another salmon. I lowered that salmon back into the water and let him go. I sat down again, not in the captain’s chair but beside it and enjoyed a moment to myself with my father.
Somewhere in that lake is a red and white feather believed by some to have magical powers that would entice fish to bite it. Somewhere in that lake is a salmon that broke a curse held over my father and I. Somewhere in the lake are the stories that my father told me while we were fishing. Somewhere on the lake, the loon still sings his lonely song as evening arrives and somewhere over that lake called The Smile of the Great Spirit, my father is looking down, watching me fish, with that proud smile on his face as he sees on the end of my line a lure that is orange with black dots on it. I did listen to your lessons after all, Dad.

Great tear jerker story.thanks for sharing.polebreaker

That was great. I too, had a tear running down my cheek when I finished reading. Thank you... made me think of similar times with my grandfather.

Having just lost my mother..(3 weeks ago)..This story made me think of her...funny when i was younger she used to pack sandwhiches and soda..then as an adult it went to cheese crackers .& Beer...thanks for the memories mom

You can't ask for better memories than that. What a tear jerker indeed. thanks for sharing.

Thanks for sharing...I tried to read it to my wife , but she had to finish reading it as I couldn't finish reading it out loud to her.
You have just shared a glimpse at why this stuff is so important to all of us!

Thanks

Wow.....great story. I too have many memories of similar days.I remember last year out on the water with my young grandson fishing and his mother calling and asking what we were doing and I said "building memories". Thanks for the story and I hope someday one of my sons or grandsons look back at the times we have had with the same thoughts. Fishing in so many ways is so spiritual. Staight lines to all.

Tom

Wow Speechless! Great story hit home for this kid!!!!


Cool Water

Link,

Give me a shout 603-455-0268

Trav

WOW, thanks for sharing that story with us! I would trade anything for a few more minutes with my Dad, enjoy them while you have them...

Wow, great story, thanks for sharing it with us.

Great story, I spend a lot time on the lake with my kids, I hope it means as much to them as it does to me. Thanks for sharing.

Link,

Your words speak of a wonderful relationship between you and your father. It brings back many wonderful memories.

As young boys we don't have the wisdom to appreciate those special times we spent with them and we don't understand the messages that they passed down until sometime later in life. We become older and wiser and find ourselves sharing those same moments with our own children.

You warmed my heart tonight and caused me stop to think back about those special moments in my life that I too shared with my dad.

Thanks,

Roger-

Hey there Link, as was said by the others Thanks for bringing a tear to my eye, as I was reading it I could remember all the wonderful times of fishing up on 1st Conn. Lake with my dear old Grandpa. and also thinking of all the times my daughter has been out fishing with me and hoping she remembers and treasures those times long after I'm gone, Big old dumb frenchman still wiping his cheek Thanks for the Bringing back some of the best memories of my "Life" Take Care God Bless LOL Dave From up North

This is a wonderful, heartfelt story. My son & I had many a memorable fishing trip to Squam Lake as he grew up. I was most touched by the lines, "my father and I could talk without ever having to say a word". Only fathers and sons can possibly understand the meaning of that. Wonderful sentiment.

Yup, nuff said. Life is truly 2 short, never enough time to smell the smell the roses let alone tie on a huge landlock fatty. Thanks muchly for sharing, touched me like all, and hopefully like all sparked memories of time past as well as possibilities of presents and futures. Tight lines all, and thanks again!