“Beginnings”

Written by Weaver Barksdale on June 8, 2016. Posted in Ruminations.

“Fly-fishing has many attributes, but none more pleasing than its ability to find and liberate the young boy that still hides within me and to let that boy live again without embarrassment or regret, sorrow or anguish.”

Harry Middleton

My first fishing experience occurred during a family vacation in Florida. My sister, who was eleven, and I, age five, were contestants in a small-fry fishing contest held at a lagoon on the grounds of the resort where we were staying. Our older brothers were playing golf with our father, and our mother was doing whatever it is that mothers do when they are temporarily relieved of their maternal duties.

Most of my memories are olfactory – the pungent odor of the wood and pitch on the dock from which we fished, the yeasty aroma of the dough balls that served as bait, and the musty smell of the dark water wherein dwelt our prey. I recollect that my sister won a prize that day, but, from a distance of forty-four years, I can’t recall whether it was for catching the most fish or the largest one. I also remember being instructed to pay careful attention to the bobber affixed to my line and to look for the presence of bubbles, which, I was told, were signs of aquatic life.

I heeded this lesson well and every now and then, when I would see a column of bubbles betraying (supposedly) the position of a fish, I would pick up my line and plop the bait in the new and more promising spot. During many of these exercises, one of the teenage supervisors would notice that my hook was bare, the dough having been nibbled away by fish that clearly knew how this game was played.

I didn’t mind, however, for these occurrences afforded the opportunity to pinch off another gooey piece of dough and affix it to the hook. Thus re-armed, I would flip the bait out and renew my bobber vigil. Being a normal boy of that age, my attention eventually began to wander – to the bugs crawling on the dock, the ducks paddling in the water, and the various golfers expressing audible displeasure at having hit a drive into the lagoon. In fact, it was during just such an episode when my sister noticed that my bobber was submerged. “Pull it up!” she urged, and when I complied, I found a living creature – one that I now know to be a pumpkinseed – attached to the end of my line.

I was awestruck. In fact, it would be fair to say I was petrified, for I remained frozen in place while the small fish thrashed frantically in mid-air. One of the supervisors grabbed my line, removed the hook, and held the pumpkinseed out for my inspection. The thing glistened with what seemed to be more colors than a large box of Crayolas. “Good job,” the supervisor congratulated me as she tossed the fish back to its watery home. I remained in suspended animation. How had this happened?

It was a mystery. It was magic! The pumpkinseed was free. I was hooked.

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The car slowed as it approached, and the driver, a teenager, rolled down the window and asked us, “Where did you catch that?” He was referring to the large fish that my next-door-neighbor, Bill, and I were carrying between us. “Down at Richland Creek,” Bill responded as we pointed the direction with our fishing poles. The car peeled out, its driver presumably on the way to duplicate our feat. We could have told him not to bother. There was only one “Big Daddy” and he was ours. Well, technically he was hooked by my friend, but more about that anon.

Nashville’s Richland Creek courses through several residential areas – one of them near my boyhood home – before joining the Cumberland River. My neighborhood friends and I had the idea of building a boat that would enable us to navigate the entire length of the stream – a worthy adventure for four pre-adolescent boys. Like most of our grand schemes, the boat construction never came to fruition. We didn’t have the tools, materials or skills to construct a craft that would be up to the task. Even if we had, we would have been hard pressed to find the time what with all the wars we had to fight. There were Johnny Tremaine and the Swamp Fox against the Red Coats, Davy Crockett at the Alamo, the Civil War, cowboys and Indians and World War II. We had no knowledge of the Spanish-American War, World War I or Korea because they hadn’t been popularized on television or in the comic books – our exclusive sources of information in those days.

We usually had no problem finding volunteers to be Indians. We all thought that tomahawks and bows and arrows were pretty cool. Sneaking through the woods and making animal sounds to signal each other was also considered de rigeur. It wasn’t so easy to find willing Red Coats or Germans, and we usually drew straws to see who would be the “bad guys.” No way, however, would any of us play the role of the despised Yankees. So we Rebs trained our weapons, loaded with limitless ammunition, on imaginary Blue Bellies. The carnage that ensued made the Battles of Franklin and Nashville look like mere skirmishes by comparison.

When we weren’t slaying enemies or playing baseball, summer days often found us down at the creek. We fished from a golf cart bridge suspended over a pool that was just below a small dam — an obstruction that created water hazards for several holes at the local country club. In the pool there resided a sizable number of pan fish that proved to be easy targets for our sight casting, dapping really, of dough balls and the occasional worm or cricket.

Our tackle consisted of bamboo poles and 12-15 feet of braided forty-pound test line that we affixed to the poles with granny knots. On the business end of these cables we attached rather sizable hooks, say about a number six. We weren’t concerned with stealth. Instead, we wanted to be ready in case a whopper was to make an appearance at the old fishin’ hole. We liked to think BIG even though most of the fish we caught easily fit into our ten-year-old sized palms.

Our hopes were realized one happy day when we noticed an ominous presence lurking in the shadows of the pool. Additional sightings over the following weeks confirmed that, indeed, a lunker had taken up residence. A fish of this size needed a name, so we dubbed him, “Big Daddy,” and vowed to catch him. The large fish quickly became something of a legend. For the better part of two summers we tempted him with every bait and lure we could lay our hands on. In addition to our usual dough balls and worms, we presented a variety of impaled insects and deli meats. Heck, we liked ham, bologna, hot dogs and bacon; why wouldn’t he? We even dangled our captured bluegills in front of his nose, but he would have nothing to do with them. We gave up on the proteins and went with a vegetarian menu – beans, corn and potato chips. He showed no interest in the carbohydrates, and spurning all of our offerings, he continued to fin lazily around the pool.

Out of desperation we decided to go native and attempt to spear him. We attached a frog gig to the end of a mop handle (sorry Mom) and tied a retrieval cord to the other end. One of us would stand on the rocks in the pool and, on the instructions of those standing on the bridge, launch the deadly missile. We all took turns to no avail. Big Daddy continued to elude us and to haunt our dreams.

He finally succumbed to a mere dough ball. I was in the process of rebaiting my hook when I heard Bill shout, “I got him! I got Big Daddy!” I scrambled to my feet and looked over the rail of the bridge. Sure enough, the object of our quest was splashing about at the end of Bill’s line, clearly annoyed that he had been stung by what had appeared to be an easy meal. Bill’s pole was bent to the point of breaking, and it was questionable as to who had caught whom. Because my friend needed both hands just to (barely) hold the pole, there was only one way to land the fish.

“Swing it over here so I can reach the line and haul him in,” I said. As Bill complied the pole began to make ominous cracking noises. Oblivious to the burns and lesions that my fingers suffered in the cause, I grabbed the line and pulled the fish up hand-over-hand. To this day I have a scar on my right index finger – a boyhood badge of honor. At length I was able to toss the fish onto the bridge where he lay at the feet of the conquering heroes, who were whooping and dancing with abandon. When the adrenaline rush had ebbed a bit, we examined our catch more closely. The large hook had been straightened by his weight and the barb was precariously attached to a thin section of the upper lip. No question, we had been lucky from start to finish.

It turned out that Big Daddy wasn’t a bass after all. Bill’s father identified our fish as a carp. He was, however, careful not to dampen our youthful enthusiasm by suggesting that a carp is a “trash fish.” I learned the lowly status of carp only years later.

I have caught hundreds of fish in the intervening years. Most were no doubt prettier and a few were larger. Nonetheless, the capture of Big Daddy resonates more clearly with pure joy and excitement than any other fishing memory.

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How and where I fish have changed over the years, but why I fish will never change. Fishing is a puzzle that requires patience, curiosity and a desire to learn.
Fishing involves nature, science, folklore and the interconnectedness of things.

Fishing offers anticipation and frustration, disappointment and exhilaration.

Fishing can afford either solitude or companionship.

Fishing is about hope.

Fishing is about life.