Hello everyone! As I gazed out my window across the small lake where we lived it reminded me of a fishing adventure that we enjoyed one summer morning. So why don’t we open my journal and take a look at what happened that beautiful morning at “Little Joe Lake”.

It was early as we got ready to go fishing. The ‘we’ being my dad, my brother and myself. My brother didn’t usually come along with dad and I, but he did enjoy fishing so he decided this time to join us. We loaded the 16 foot aluminum boat into the back of the truck and we were off. “Did you bring the coffee and food?”, asked dad. “Naturally,” I said, “I wouldn’t forget that.” Dad never said anything. It didn’t take long to arrive at this small lake. We had never fished here before and had never seen anyone fishing on this lake, but we figured there must be fish here. The boat was finally in the water, I climbed in first, then dad and my brother pushed us away from shore and jumped in. Dad didn’t quite sit down in time and the boat rocked quite a bit. Things like that always made dad dizzy. He certainly sat down quickly. “Bonehead”, was all he said.

Already he’s enjoying himself. It was about 5:45 am as we started our journey around this lake. “Very shallow lake,” I said. My brother agreed. “Won’t be any fish here,” he added. “Just be patient,” said dad. At the half way point we hadn’t caught any fish, not even a nibble. “Waste of time,” said my brother. I agreed. After a bit we came to a spot with deeper water. “This looks like a good spot,” said dad, “let’s sit here for a bit.” So we did. Nothing. Dad asked for my tackle box, he had forgotten to bring his. I closed the lid, picked it up and handed it to him nicely. He grabbed the handle. “No,” I yelled, but too late. The whole tackle box emptied into the boat with a loud crash! “You’re scaring the fish,” said my brother. “What fish?”, I asked. “Good point,” he said.

We both started to laugh. “Ha, ha,” said dad, “why didn’t you close the lid tight?” “I did, but the latch is broken,” I explained, “that’s why I pick it up from the bottom.” “Why didn’t you tell me?,” he asked. “I told you the last time we went fishing,” I responded. “That was a month ago,” said dad. “See, you remembered, and you still grabbed the handle,” I said. “Bonehead,” dad said, “help me pick up this mess.” “Fine,” I said, “no fish anyway.” “Not with you two making so much noise,” my brother commented. I moved to the back of the boat to help dad pick up everything. Dad sat down and yelled! “You’re scaring the fish again,” said my brother. “What fish?,” I asked, and we both started laughing again. Meanwhile, dad was trying to remove a hook from his pants. “Let me help,” I suggested. “NO, stay away!,” he yelled.

“Stop scaring the fish,” I said. “What fish,” responded my brother. That really got us laughing. “How can you two laugh so much at nothing?,” dad asked. “Must be the early morning,” I said. “And no fish,” my brother added. Now we’re laughing so much it’s hard to breathe. Finally dad got the hook out of his pants, but, he also ripped a rather large hole in them. Dad just groaned as he looked at the hole. “Wait until mom sees that,” I said, “it’s the second hole in 2 weeks, wouldn’t be so bad if it was the same pants.” Now our laughing is uncontrollable! Dad decided on one more cast before having some coffee. Amazingly he caught a fish. He stood up all excited and saying to get the net ready. My brother and I both said to sit down, we don’t want people to see that we are actually catching fish. Not that there was anyone around. Dad agreed and he quickly sat down. He looked at his line lying in the water. He lost his fish in all the excitement. He just groaned. “You should be more careful,” I said. “I should have come by myself,” he answered.

We did end up catching 3 more fish, one each, but our second trip to this lake was a bit more profitable. Perhaps I will talk about that another time. I do hope you have a wonderful day and God bless!

Steve and Muffin.

©2020 Steve McLeod.