Fishing

I took my kids fishing today. Alone. I've never been fishing alone in my life. I have always relied upon the expertise of my father or whatever other man was there to tell me what lure to use, how to bait the hook, how to cast the line, how to get the hook out of the fish's mouth, where to fish, how to fish, how to cast...I haven't gone fishing since I turned 16 and needed a license to do so. Just...never really seemed important, though I do enjoy fishing, so I deferred the option to the kids' dad when they got old enough to want to do it...figured it was something he could do with them that he would enjoy. Fishing is fun. Fishing is something I can do with them right here. We were going fishing.

I walked into the store and quickly got my sticky gloves and my needle nosed pliers in the tool aisle--those were things I knew I wanted (Walmart is good for this anyway...one-stop shopping). I have no problem touching fish...but some of them are prickly, and...well, I don't know which ones, to be honest. And since I would be the only grown-up standing there at the river, I had to be able to yank whatever came out of the water off those poles. I headed over to get my license, approached the rods and reels and bait, and just kind of panned from one end of the aisle to the other.  I had no idea what I was looking for in that aisle, despite my crash course on what kind of fish I would find in the river and what kinds of things they would like. Like...what the heck is spinnerbait (it has too many prongy thingies on it and I knew I was going to have ripped-apart fingers with those)?? Do you know how many different boxes full of contraptions that all look the same line this aisle? And they are so not the same. I know now. Because the woman who stood there and told me she spends more on fishing tackle than she does on shoes and clothes told me so. I think she took pity on me when she noticed the blank stare on my face. Honestly, I don't know if she actually knew what she was talking about. But she sure seemed to. She started talking about "chartreuse" and "pumpkin seed" bait thingies and how power bait had a scent and all this stuff...woo! Point me to it, lady! I will put it in my cart. Frankly, I didn't even care. I wanted to fish. I wanted to take my kids fishing. Who cares about the right lures?? We live half a mile from the river. Let's. Go. Fishin.

We got the license (which has the wrong address...I need to go fix that), grabbed a few groceries (yay, Walmart!), and quickly made our way home. I strung up the poles, ripped the stupid reels off the inexpensive poles I got two of the kids to make them actually function (found out later I screwed something up in the process, I think), tied jigs on the lines, opened up all the tiny little packages and stuck them in the tackle box (with the pliers. and scissors.), and we drove to the river (the plan was to walk, but, umm, by the time all of that happened, we had an hour and a half until the girls had to be at youth group. and supper to prepare/eat. we drove). The walk to the river from the car...proved interesting. Hehe. The kids do not like walking through  deep grass next to the river...apparently there are critters there. And, actually, I confirmed that, long about the time I wasn't watching ahead of me, but rather talking behind me, and stepped directly into a woodchuck hole. Hehe. Thankfully, I just smashed my finger and didn't break a leg. Which I wouldn't put past me. On a fishing trip to the river. Sheesh. We found our spot on the rocks, and the kids cast their lines.

I learned a lesson from my dad somewhere along the way...when taking kids fishing, if you bring your own pole and think you're actually going to fish, you're just going to wind up frustrated. You spend more time untangling lines, baiting hooks, pulling hooks out of fishies' mouths, running back and forth between children, rescuing kids from falling in the river...it's just a better idea not to even bring your pole. I did not take my pole.

It's a good thing.

Within 5 minutes, Bryson has "caught" a submerged tree. Cut line #1. Re-hook and "bait" and sinker line #1 (by the way, I have no idea what to do with sinkers. Or hooks. Or bait. I don't care.). 2 minutes after Bryson hooks the tree, Reasa has hooked something waaaaay out in the river (a rock?)...and can't reel anything in (see above paragraph regarding the disassembly of her reel). Cut line #2. Spend 15 minutes attempting to untangle the mess of line inside Reasa's reel. Finally give up and resort to scissors, put the thing back together, shaking my head, promising to hand it to my dad the next time I see him so he can show me why I can't make the thing function.  Child #1 (Reasa) splooshes her muck boot allllll the way into the water, resulting in giggling and screeching (after she gets over her "I'm just a disaster! I break everything I touch!" tirade. Oh my GOSH she's so 12.). Laine gives Reasa her rod because, frankly, she'd rather scope out the rocks and see how many times she can slip on them and how many brush burns she can aquire (sigh. why did she have to inherit THAT quality??). At one point, I kid you not, these words came out of her mouth: "Oh my gosh! Mom! I just found spam!!" She also found several walmart bags and picked her way through the rocks, collecting junk so we could take it home and declutter the scenery. Love that kid.  Bryson did wind up getting a couple of bites. The river was stunningly gorgeous, despite the road noise from the Dennison Parkway bridge. And we saw a couple of big...somethings...jump out of the water out in the middle.

I warned the kids that if we pulled in any giant muskies, I was cutting the line. The end.

I suck at fishing. But we had a great time. The hour we spent at the river...we will so do again. Next time I will suck at fishing just as badly...but I still won't care.

Fun lessons learned, text messaged to my friend mid-process:

Lesson 1: One adult per two children. Not three.

Lesson 2: Buy the better rods. Even for the kids. Especially for the kids.

Lesson 3: The kids don't care if they catch anything. It's all about casting the farthest.

Lesson 4: Extra. Jigs.

Lesson 5: Laugh. Who cares about fish?

Looking forward to future lessons. :)