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by A.wa.re on Thu Jan 07, 2010 10:08 am
[[If it's still okay to be filling out prompts on such an old thread..]]
"Damn, that's one big fish!"
There was something inherently irritating about just sitting back and waiting for the line to snag. I made a prompt note of this as I tugged the cowboy hat down over my eyes, reclining uncomfortably against the musty wood surface of the tiny dinghy that I lay in the bilge of. Secure against the sun, I peered out from beneath the shield of the hat, only to be blinded by the shine of the long, sleek fishing rod reflecting sheer light into my eyes. Squinting, I darted my head down again.
Certainly there are people who find something very appealing about fishing. Perhaps it is the easygoing nature of the sport, with only an occasional adrenaline rush- perhaps a metaphor for the way the practitioners wished they lived their lives. Perhaps it is the philosophy of fishing- all one has to do is sit back and wait and sooner or later (typically later) their lack of work will harvest itself in the form of a catch.
With this in mind, I decided that fishing must have been the laziest sport in existence.
At about the time I made that decision, however, a large hand smacked onto my shoulder, causing me to jump out of my reverie and glower up at the owner. "You have fishbait on your hands," I snapped.
Gazing up at Carlos, it occurred to me that there may be one more reason why one may practice fishing- the reason why I did it, namely: because the practitioner may just unfortunately happen to have a friend who found some incredible appeal in sitting back in the middle of the afternoon sun in the middle of a lake and waiting for a fish to be stupid enough to bite that bait.
The idiot of an older man grinned down at me. (Here I decided that idiot wasn't semantically correct- all personality flaws aside, and considering his barely-evident yet prolific expertise in physics, Carlos was more of an idiot savant.) "Ya just gotta be patient, kid," he remarked in his low, peasantlike growl of a voice, as if he'd just read my mind. "Dinner comes when it comes."
My eyes narrowed and I recrossed my arms, blatantly aware of how the merciless surface of the wooden dinghy dug uncomfortably into my back. "Dinner will come when it's dinner time," I retorted, tapping my pale hands against my arms. One never got enough sunlight in college, and the pinkish hue my flesh was beginning to take under the sun was just proving it.
And, as if to contradict me, my pole bent at an angle an inexperienced fisher may have thought completely impossible, making a high arch and straining against the weight my legs had pressed against it. I sat up, feeling the fresh impression of the dinghy against my back, and wrapped my hands around the pole, yanking gently. Even as the thrill of a catch caught me, I couldn't help but feel a little sullen at whatever fish this may have been, contradicting me like it was.
Carlos's rough laughter filled my ears as I yanked again, grunting with effort. "Damn, that must be one big fish," he commented with an amused tone as he watched me struggle. Finally, the middle-aged man decided to make some use of himself and took the rod from my grasp, easing in the fish in his own experienced, perfected technique as he stood in the dinghy with impeccable balance. I watched his silhouette, squinting at the midday sun glaring down heat upon us just behind him, and listened to the trashing noise of the the catch.
I wasn't completely expecting it when a two-foot long thrashing fish was tossed out of the water by the rod and smacked headlong into my face, and when the slapping collision happened I made an embarrassing outcry before falling backwards into the bilge, fish and all. Cursing, I wrapped my arms around the slipping, flailing creature, rolling onto my stomach and pinning the squirming, strong frame beneath me, getting thoroughly wet in the process.
"Imbecilic fish," I snarled angrily, but when I looked up all I could see was the silhouette of Carlos, rocking the dinghy back and forth in his own laughter.
It was here, wet and pinning a squirming, slimy fish to the bottom of the dinghy as it rocked back and forth to the rhythm of a retired physicist's laugher, that I sulkily decided that while fishing may have not been a lazy sport, it was one where you risked getting slapped in the face by a few pounds of flapping fish.
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