It’s September and in a few short weeks, we’ll be feeling the temperatures begin to drop, and the air get dryer. It’ll feel good. The football season and match-ups will drift into your thoughts. The golden days of autumn will wrap us in crisp, dry days just filled with outdoor activities. You’ll have lots to things to do, lots of trips to arrange; fishing will be excellent. Deer hunting will be the talk of every guy in camo; thousands will fill local stadiums for Friday night high school contests and the colors of burnished yellows and dark reds of the mountains will draw campers from all walks of life. You and your family will be really busy. I’ve been there. I know what you’ll do; you’ll try and do it all. That’s OK.
But what I want to recommend here is for you to recall those times as a youth when your family weren’t quite so busy, when every moment wasn’t filled with planned activity, when every evening and weekend wasn’t with a group of thousands. Take a moment to recall long ago when you and your dad went fishing alone or walked the edges of a frosty cornfield with shotguns cradled. Sometimes it’s better to be able to look forward to individual instruction, individual attention and one on one conversation.
Don’t you remember when you, and your father or grandfather had a fishing or hunting trip planned, and you knew it was going to be just the two of you? I do. I was always lying in bed wake and waiting for the sounds of the floor creaking as he got up and started the day. My mother would make lunch, and we carried it in a brown paper bag. We had no coolers. We just took a Mason jar that doubled for a thermos. I dressed in jeans with big rolled-up cuffs, a striped tee-shirt and an Atlanta Crackers’ baseball cap. I had one old square fiberglass rod and a Zebco 33. Boy was I nervous. I either talked a mile a minute or not at all.
We bought a small box of red wigglers for 50 cents. The bait shop guy would pour the wigglers out on a cardboard sheet to make sure there were plenty there. If an extra coin or two was available, a small sleeve of crickets came along too. Sometimes, in preparation, I would catch grasshoppers or crickets myself for several days before hand by putting a piece of loaf bread in a gallon jar in the bushes on the lot next door. I’d catch a dozen or more. As far as the catching goes, a few lonely bluegills fell to our offerings, but it didn’t really matter, we were there together. I would roam the banks trying one spot after another thrilled at the sight of a small bass or two and thinking that one would bite on the next cast.
The point is to spend some time together planning and going. I’ve never forgotten those days. I’m sure you remember them too. Why not plan a trip soon with your son, grandson, daughter or granddaughter, not to a football game, not with a crowd, just you two. I guarantee you’ll see eyes light up in anticipation and la little person thrilled to be thought of as so special as to be taken fishing.
By O’Neill Williams