Gone Fishin'

“Gone fishin’ by a shady wady pool

I’m wishin’ I could be that kind of fool

I’d say no more work for mine

On my door I’d hang a sign

Gone fishin’ instead of just a wishin’”

            Bing Crosby sings to me from my iPod as I drive along.  He’s hit just the right sentiment in my opinion.  I’m looking out at one of the retention ponds that now dot the urban landscape.  The blue sky is reflected on the water which is broken into hundreds of little ripples by a light breeze.  The cattails are gently rocked by that same wind, and a swallow skims the pond’s surface.  It is a small scale version of a scene repeated so many times in my past.

            In my mind’s eye I’m not looking at a small pond surrounded by houses, but rather Raccoon Lake in the 1970’s.  My parents and I are tracking through the mud about to clamber into a small, flat-bottomed jon boat.  My old, canvas tennis shoes leave their muddy prints on the aluminum bottom as I climb over the seats, each with a life cushion resting in the middle.  I’m small and not a good swimmer, so I have my orange life vest strapped tightly around my chest.  I sit in the middle seat of the boat while Mom takes up her position in the bow.  Dad hands mom the fishing poles, the tackle box and the bucket of minnows before taking hold of the lip of the boat, lifting it off the mud and shoving off into the water.  With a knee on the front seat, he kicks his other leg over the side and gingerly makes his way to the back of the boat.  He primes the small outboard motor and gives several tugs before the Johnson engine belches to life, and we are off.

            Our destination is a steep bank several inlets away from our little cove.  The magic spot is where several trees have toppled into the water, the soil having washed from beneath their roots.  The vast network of branches below the water’s surface creates a perfect hiding place for the crappie we are seeking.   Dad guides the boat into position then lowers the anchor over the side.  The rope uncoils and slides through the pulley for a surprisingly long time, demonstrating that the steepness of the rock strewn bank above the water continues well below.  We’re not far from the shore, yet the water here is very deep.  As the boat swings into position, Dad drops the matching anchor from the bow of the boat, and again the rope hums through the guide until the anchor settles in the soft mud below.

            And now the fun begins.  Poles are distributed all around, and hooks are baited.  I’m still too young for this task so Mom scoops out a minnow and slides it onto my hook.  The minnow continues to wiggle as Mom casts out my line.  We use slip bobbers, so the orange and white float lies on its side as the line is pulled through by the weight of the minnow and a small lead sinker clamped a short distance above.  When the knot we have tied to the line reaches the bobber, it stops and the bobber pops to attention.  We measure our depth by the length of our fishing pole, so today we are fishing two pole lengths deep. 

            Mom and Dad cast their lines near mine, and we begin the waiting period.  The sun is warm on our backs, and Dad strips off his shirt.  A dragonfly pauses on the anchor rope for a moment before launching itself back into the air.  The water laps against the side of the boat, tapping out its steady meter and gently moving our bobbers slowly away from the boat.  After several minutes, one of the bobbers quickly dips then rights itself.  It dips again then suddenly disappears below the surface.  Dad jerks his rod into the air and begins reeling in his line.  The tip of the pole bends as the line traces a zigzag pattern in the water.  Finally, a silver flash appears in the murky water below, and Dad pulls a good size crappie into the boat.  The scene would be repeated over and over throughout the morning- the dancing bobber suddenly disappearing from view, a quick tug of the line then a squirming fish brought to the surface.  In between these catches, we’ve snagged a few of the trees branches.  Most of the time we are able to pull our line free, but on a couple of occasions, the tree has won and the fishing line has snapped.   The goal now becomes to gently reel in the remaining line while trying to coax the bobber to the boat, but invariably someone’s bobber will break free and float away.  My father is frugal, so when after a couple hours of fishing we decide to return home, the anchors are pulled free of the sticky clay which seems bent on keeping them forever fixed to the lake floor, and the boat is guided to the bank to retrieve our runaway bobber.  Later we will scale and filet our catch, tossing the small slabs of meat into an old cottage cheese container to freeze for future meals and the carcasses into a deep hole dug into the loamy soil of the adjacent woods.

My brother, Jerry and I (along with my little life vest) showing off our morning catch.

            This scene was repeated hundreds of times in our two decades at the lake.  The boats changed through the years.  When we first went to the lake, we borrowed a row boat before advancing to the jon boat.  I always enjoyed the rhythmic creaking of the oars in their locks as Dad pulled on the handles and sliced their blades through the water, creating miniature whirlpools that twisted away and swirled past me as I watched from the back of the boat.  Later we purchased a small speedboat, but by the end of our time at Raccoon, we had moved on to a comfortable pontoon.  Just as our boats changed over time, so too did our fishing spots.  There were always a few tried and true locations that could be depended upon for an almost certain catch, and still others which were chosen based upon the most current scuttlebutt of other fisherman.  However, there was one location which remained a constant each March and April.  Swollen by the heavy spring rains, the lake would rise and flood the wooded edges.  A couple inlets away, a grove of small maple and willow trees became a prime spot for spawning crappie.  This was the period of our small speedboat, and Dad would ease the boat into the trees then climb out onto its nose.  From this perch, he could pull the boat by hand from tree to tree and was in a good position to reach his pole even deeper into the flooded maples.  Here the fishing was fast and furious, and we had the added excitement of trying to retrieve our catch through the maze of branches.   This was the time of year my father most enjoyed. 

Me holding the crappie with which my mother won the fishing rodeo down at the lake. 

            Once spawning was over, we returned to our more traditional sites of felled trees or sunken stumps.  However, with summer came additional fishing opportunities.  There was always the early morning trip as the sun was just breaking in the eastern sky, but to this was added night fishing.  Our target fish was different at night with Crappie being abandoned for silver bass.  As the last rays of light faded into darkness, we would again head out onto the water.  A chorus of frogs would call from the water’s edge while screech owls hooted their eerie calls from the surrounding woods.   For the first few years, we joined our neighbors at a popular spot just outside our cove.  Several old stumps, accompanied by discarded Christmas trees, covered the bottom of the lake at this point.  To mark the spot, someone had tied an old Coppertone suntan lotion bottle to a long line and anchored it to one of the stumps below.  Boats would gather in a large circle around this bottle, and one by one they would begin lighting there Coleman lanterns.  I can still hear the sizzle as the wick would grow bright and the smell of burnt lantern fuel wafted up to my nose.  The lantern was then positioned over the side of the boat where it would start attracting a cloud of small insects.  As the insects swarmed, a good number would invariably fall into the water thus drawing minnows.  The minnows, along with the light from the lantern, attracted still larger fish, and these were our ultimate goal.  It always took longer than I liked for the fish to start biting, but once they did the action was fast-paced, and it took very little time to fill a stringer with bass.  

Author with the previous night's catch of silver bass

I will always recall the one evening when the fishing was especially good, and the stringer was filled to nearly capacity by some pretty good-sized fish.  It was late and we were pulling up anchor, but my father was reaching deep into the water behind the boat.  I thought he was having trouble with the anchor until I realized he didn’t even have the anchor rope in his hands.  When we asked what he was doing, he sheepishly answered that the stringer had accidentally slipped from his hand.  He even went as far as to troll the area with a bare hook on his line trying to snag the runaway fish, but of course he was unsuccessful.  Word quickly got around camp, and I can remember the next day one of the neighbors joked that his buddy had been out the night before and had miraculously caught a whole stringer full of fish.   Ah, good ole fish tales!

There was other fishing, as well.  Lazy, hot summer afternoons were the perfect time to fish for carp.  For us, carp were not for food but for fun given that they were by far the strongest fighters of all the fish that inhabited the lake.  My first experience with them was when I was about seven or eight years old.  My parents and I were fishing from the small row boat when I hooked a large carp.  I fought it valiantly, picturing the deep sea fishing I used to watch on Wide World of Sports, and I soon learned the sheer strength of carp as our little boat started being pulled along the water.  It was my very first carp, and I felt as if I had just landed a marlin.  This is the only time I can remember carp fishing from the water.  Usually, my carp fishing was from the bank or from a boat tied up to shore.  Many summer afternoons, I lounged on the back of our pontoon, one eye on my pole and the other eye on a teenage girl about my age that usually appeared on the opposite bank for an afternoon swim.  I landed lots of carp, but I never did meet that girl!

Our never-failing bait was a dough ball made from stale Wheaties and garlic powder.  A small ball of this formed over a treble hook was irresistible to a passing carp.  For me carp fishing is a much more relaxed form of angling than either crappie or bass fishing.  You cast out a line without a bobber since the carp are bottom feeders, reel in any slack until there is just a gentle curve of line extending to the water, and then you wait.  As the carp take the bait, you notice that the bowed line suddenly tenses and jerks.  You must still wait a little longer until the line starts playing out and moving away. That is the time to set the hook and the fight is on.  Carp are extremely strong, and one must be careful because they are good at diving for cover.  I have lost several carp to broken lines as they swam into brush or around dock posts.  As I’ve already said, carp are not considered a fish worth eating, so we would release them at the end of the day.  A special treat, sort of like grabbing the brass ring on a carousel, was catching a goldfish.  Only my mother seemed capable of this, almost always hauling in a 12 to 18 inch bright orange fish with each outing.

Small crappie and bluegill caught from limestone ledge high above the water.

Through the years there were variations on the theme.  There was the early period of cane pole fishing, fishing for bluegill at a nearby pond, cat fishing with stink bait, unsuccessfully attempting to catch crappie with jigs, a cold and equally unsuccessful attempt at ice fishing, fishing from high above the lake on a limestone ledge, and trying for largemouth bass with lures.  My bass fishing period was short-lived but eventful.  On my very first day of trying for a largemouth, I had hoped to use a frog lure that was in my brother’s boat.  He didn’t want me to disturb his own fishing, so he tossed the rubber frog lure to me, missing my boat and sending the lure slowly drifting to the bottom of the lake.  He then fished around in the tackle box, found a Hula Popper and tossed that to me successfully.  I tied it onto my line and started casting at some willows, slowly popping the lure back to the boat.  On about the third cast, there was a loud splash as a huge lunker rose to hit the lure, and I immediately set the hook.  It was putting up an incredible fight, and my brother, who earlier had not wanted me near, suddenly took an interest in the battle.  As he paddled his boat which contained the fish net towards mine, he coached me on how to slowly ease the fish to my boat.  At one point the bass jumped free of the water, impressing us both with its size.  But just as my brother arrived, the line snapped and my trophy fish was gone!  I was heartbroken but now more determined than ever.  That afternoon I went to Ebert’s, the small family run fishing/grocery store that supplied the camp with all its needs, and purchased a new Hula Popper.  Early the next morning, I was back at the clump of willows casting out my line, when suddenly a large bass jumped in front of me.  I looked at the growing rings of concentric circles marking the spot of the splash, and there floating on the water, where the fish had just jumped, was the lure I had lost the previous day.  Could it be that the bass I had hooked just 24 hours earlier had reappeared to spit out my lure and mock me?  It seemed like a fishy version of “Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me twice, shame on me.”   I retrieved my “lucky lure,” but never again was I able to hook a largemouth.

My lucky Hula Popper

The memories drift away as Bing and Satchmo are winding down the song, the pond well behind me in the distance.  It is emblematic of my fishing experiences since they, too, are well behind me.  It has been 30 years since I’ve seriously fished.  How I miss those quiet days on the water and the mornings and evenings spent with my parents.  I would love to cast a line back in time, hook those days and pull them back to me, but that is just another one that got away.

The Lake

I am a city boy, born and bred, yet nothing held sway over my formative years more than my time at “the lake.”  The lake in question was Raccoon Lake, a large reservoir in west central Indiana, and the label of “the lake” referred to not only the body of water but also the woods surrounding it and the trailer park that we called our home away from home for over two decades.  Every weekend from early spring to late fall, every spring vacation and a few long stretches in the summer were spent either on the water or traipsing through the woods.  Millionaires may boast of “weekends at the Hamptoms,” but I can assure you none was every happier than I was with my weekends at the lake.

Grandma Bess, Dad, Uncle Earl, Grandpa Jesse and my cousin, Maggie enjoying a game of cards

I was first introduced to the lake when I was about five years old.  Often on Sundays my parents would pack us into the station wagon with a picnic lunch and fishing poles, and we’d go to a reservoir near Indianapolis to fish.  But that fateful weekend was different.  We left early in the morning and drove for nearly two hours before we turned off the highway and started winding through gravel covered country roads.  That in itself was new to me and only added to the excitement of what was to come.  After an endless number of turns and twists, we came to a small country store run by the family who lived in the back half of the building.  While my father bought bait for the day’s fishing, my siblings and I eyed a wall that was nothing but candy, all at the grand cost of a penny a piece.  Sure, there were a few expensive items for 15 cents, but the majority was to be had for a single penny.  My father gave us each a dime, and the decision was almost overwhelming.  I can appreciate how someone who has just won the lottery must feel because at that moment I felt every bit as rich.   With our little brown paper bags full of assorted gum, paraffin pop bottles and licorice, we climbed back into the car and headed to our final destination.

Our first trailer.  My Aunt June, my brother Jerry, me, Dad and my sister, Sheila

I can still recall how magical it seemed as we drove through the heavily wooded road and past a pair of small ponds before emerging at the trailer camp.  I had never seen mobile homes before, and I was certainly not aware of the stigma that goes with most trailer parks now.  Rather than being dismayed by these small, flimsy living quarters, I was enthralled by the myriad of shapes, sizes and colors.  Each trailer had its own little gravel lot with an outdoor fireplace and those classic metal lawn chairs of the 50’s and 60’s.  Surrounding each parcel were strings of lights hung like Chinese lanterns.  To me it looked like Christmas in the middle of summer.  As we slowly made our way down the hill that held the camp, my siblings read some of the signs people had hung on their trailers.  There was a mailbox mounted high on a pole with the words “Air Mail” painted on its side.  Next to this was a trailer named Malfunction Junction.  It was a totally foreign and mysterious world, but one I knew I would love.

Nick frying fish

Our destination was a very small trailer with a large attached porch enclosed in heavy plastic.  It belonged to the father of one of my dad’s postal employees.  Nick, who had long since retired from his years of living, working (and drinking) in the big city to settle for a quieter, sober life in the woods, was the sole permanent resident of the camp.  A short, bow-legged man with a bur haircut, Nick came walking out to greet us.  He invited us to the back of his property on the other side of the porch where a fire was crackling in a fireplace and his coonhound, Queenie rested.  Her belly was large, her breasts were filling with milk, and I was allowed to rest my hand on her stomach to feel the wiggling puppies within.  A widower, Nick’s sole companion throughout his years at the lake was always a dog.   Nick, his son, Jim, and Pete who owned the trailer next door, were gathered around a table nailed to a tree along the ravine that ran behind his property.  They were all busy cleaning fish from that morning’s catch.  After scaling each fish, they would pick up a knife and deftly fillet it before tossing the remains in a hole dug behind the tree in the woods.  It was a routine I would see repeated over and over again for years to come.  I suspect the soil behind that tree had to be some of the richest in the state given the years of fish deposited there.

My brother Jerry and I showing off our catch

Fishing was the main pastime during our years at the lake.  That day would to be our first experience, with Nick loaning us one of his boats.  In those days, the lake was quiet and the only boats you saw were either row boats, flat-bottomed John boats or the occasional pontoon.  I was still using a cane pole to fish in those days, but it didn’t lessen the fun.  I don’t recall if we caught anything, but I do know as the day wound down Dad walked across the road to talk to the family in the blue trailer.  What I did not know was that my parents were actually in discussion to buy that trailer, but  I soon learned that this magical camp would become our weekly destination, and that little blue trailer was to be the first of three trailers we were to own there.

My weekdays may have been filled with bike riding, swinging or shooting baskets in the backyard, but from the 1960’s through the early ‘80’s, my weekends were spent boating, fishing, hiking, and learning the flora and fauna surrounding our camp.  The woods became my classroom, and I began a lifelong love of nature.  In fact, I am sure that early fondness of nature and animals led to my current profession as a veterinarian.  In the 60’s, the woods around our trailer was still unspoiled.  Insect life was abundant and varied.  My sister and I would frequently return from a hike with a collection of colorful caterpillars or perhaps a large walking stick that looked more like it belonged in the Amazon than an Indiana forest.  I became adept at identifying the various wildflowers that bloomed in the spring, and I eventually created my own little wildflower garden on the edge of our lot which I suspect still blooms even now.  Thus was born my love of gardening.

My sister-in-law, Debbie, Mom, Dad and me

Our neighbor Ginny eating fish with Mom

In the Midwest, we are blessed with four very distinct and glorious seasons, and my time at the lake taught me to appreciate the unique qualities of each.  We would anxiously await the spring thaw that would signal our return each year.  At the first sign of warmth, Nick would tap the maple trees.  He would boil the sap to make sassafras tea which we drank as our “spring tonic.”  A little later, as the soil warmed more, the sponge mushrooms would make their appearance.  We were fortunate in that the morels would spring up in our very lot, although I enjoyed searching for them in the woods.  Raccoon Lake was used as flood control for the Wabash, so each spring its waters were retained, and the lake level would rise into the grove of silver maples and willows that grew on the opposite point.  Dad would nose our boat in amongst the trees, and we would fish for the spawning crappie through their branches.  Summer slowed things down and I would fish for carp from the bank.  Using a dough ball made from Wheaties and garlic powder, I would sit and watch for the telltale bob of the slack fishing line.  It would suddenly grow taut, then relax, then grow taut again before racing out across the water’s surface.  That’s when I knew the fight was on, for although carp was not a fish we ate, it was the most fun to catch since it put up the biggest fight.  For a small boy it was the equivalent of deep sea fishing.  For bluegills, I would dig up worms, grab my pole and walk to the small pond that sat beside the road into the camp.  Here the fish were not big, but they were hungry, and an active day of fishing was guaranteed.  In my high school years the summer meant early morning water skiing.  By then the lake had grown busy, and only in the mornings could I enjoy a smooth surface.  Autumn brought with it the changing of the foliage, and the ever present smell of burning leaves.  

An early morning ski run

Cooking sausage and potatoes over the fire

For me the most powerful memories are evoked every time I smell wood smoke or burning leaves.  I’m instantly transported back to those days at the lake when we always had a fire burning in the outside fireplace.  Our camp was somewhat primitive with only electricity provided to the trailers.  We hauled water from the few spigots in camp and answered the call of nature in an outhouse.  (The smell of an outhouse in August is a memory I would rather forget.)  We did have propane tanks to fuel our furnace in the trailer, but the fire was our source of outside warmth during the coldest days.  Many times we melted the tips of our shoes as we pushed our feet closer and closer to the flames to heat them.  Water for bathing or washing dishes was heated in a big black coffee pot, and of course all meals were cooked over an open fire.  Nothing has ever tasted better than those meals.  I can still picture my dad relaxing by the fire in the falling snow, beer in hand, watching supper cook on the fireplace.   Even as a young boy, I was allowed to make my own little fireplace over which I heated the smaller kettle of water to make hot tea.  I felt like a true pioneer. And it was during those years that I got my earliest experience with physical labor, helping Dad collect and cut firewood.  There were enough dead or downed trees to supply a steady source, but you had to make the effort to collect it.

Winter was the season we stayed home.  The owner turned off the water and chained the entrance to the camp; however, on a few adventurous occasions, we decided to brave the elements and make a visit.  Dad would drive as close as possible then park the car, unload our supplies on a sled and we would pull them down the hill to the trailer.  This was one of my favorite times to visit because we had the whole place to ourselves.  The snow stood deep and untouched on the tables and fences, and the camp was silent except for the calling of woodpeckers.  I would quickly head off into the woods to track the animals who had ventured near the abandoned camp, and Dad would start a fire in the pot-bellied stove we used to warm the porch.  One winter he managed to get it so hot it cracked the nearby window.  I still promise to someday relate the story of Dad’s sledding adventure during one of those winter trips, but that is a story for another day.

My friends Dan, Maris, Jim (in rear behind me) and Paul

Finally, the lake was the one place I seemed to fit in.  At home in the city, I was an awkward child with few friends.  A klutz at sports, I was shunned from joining teams and would sometimes be offered up to the other side in advance.  But at the lake, I was in my element.  I was small, light and exceptionally agile in the woods.  It was the one place I could outshine even the most athletic of my friends, but it was rare I was there with a friend.  I relished the solitude of the woods.  Whether napping on a wooded hillside or floating quietly on an inner tube, I was alone with my thoughts.  I learned to be independent, and it was there I plotted my future.  Even now when pressures become too great, I slip outside and smell the fresh air, follow the creek or listen to the birds.  Like Ishmael in Moby Dick, “It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and regulating the circulation.”

Dad working on the Honda.  Nick's little trailer is in the background.

There are many stories I could tell of the lake- nights on the water when the Milky Way painted its cloudy path across the sky, the fall that broke my mother’s leg and began her physical decline, the loss of a precious puppy, the death of a dear family friend, lightning strikes, fossil hunting, the sinking of my sister's raft, adventures on a minibike, and sadly the change from a quiet lake and empty woods into an active and dangerous waterway with a diminished woodland encroached upon by houses.  But those remain stories for the future.  For now, I want to just sit back and reflect upon those glorious early days when I was introduced to the natural world around me and began a lifelong love affair.