Fencerows: “The Old Man and the Salmon”
By John Luthens
“I wish I had the boy. To help me and to see this.” – Ernest Hemmingway,
The Old Man and the Sea
Water punishes rocks as I climb into waders on the banks of Sauk Creek in the rising sun. Hints of October gold tint the willow bottoms along the plunge pools and a single blue heron stands watch above the highest waterfall. The autumn air is slowly sharpening, readying itself to lay down its killing hand. The water is alive.
Winding for two miles below, the churning water shoots beneath the harbor-town bridges of Port Washington, Wisconsin to spill into the silent waters of Lake Michigan. I picture old fishermen claiming their spots on the harbor walls, spawn sacs and spoons weaving a net for chinook salmon at the creek’s mouth, laughing and shouting and sharing great nets to scoop at the fish below. I kneel alone and watch the moving water. If the kings have pushed this far up, word hasn’t gotten out yet.
John Luthens kneels above a salmon run on Sauk Creek.
A splash bursts my morning thoughts. I almost spill my egg flies. It is a wet thrash of tail on rocks, pure exhilaration. My fumbling fingers tie on an orange-yarn streamer that looks like a snarled ball in my fly box. I mouth a quick prayer that it will lay out more like salmon spawn when it hits the water.
I should know better. If my son were here, he’d tell it to me straight “That’s a 6 -weight fly rod and these salmon are fresh from the lake. When are you going trade in that little trout net that you always carry? You don’t have a chance in hell of landing one like that!”
He isn’t. School and work and girlfriends; the life of a boy becoming a man; I was young once, too. I remember how it was. I grew up and turned into an old fisherman. I wish he was here to see this. I should have brought a bigger net. Plop, goes my egg fly.
The pool is roiling as the fly hits the spray. I catch a faint glimpse of movement in the deep water below. Movement is the wrong word. The shadows look like sharks. Orange yarn disappears into the swirl.
My son has keener eyes. He’s sometimes climbs a tree to get a better angle, calling down directions like a field general. “Cast a little further to the left…no, your other left! There you go… hold it right in front of him. Twitch it, make him mad…”
I feel resistance, like being hooked on a log and not knowing how deeply the hook is imbedded in the bark; testing it, trying to pull without breaking line. When the log starts to move, I give it all I’ve got. My rod bends in half. I wish he were here to see the line smoke off the reel.
Slides of rapids barricade both sides of the pool. The king and I are trapped; too tired to shoot further up the cascade, and not yet ready to let the current sing us back down to the great lake. It is a battle that has played out for generations. I reel to the breaking point and the salmon stretches line to the limit. It goes on like this for untold minutes.
Four or five other salmon move through the pool. Water splashes in the air as my hooked fish bumps into ones that are ascending. It is a spectacle of the highest order. A moment like this is meant to be shared. It is a legend to be passed down. I talk to myself and talk to the salmon. If my son were here he would laugh and call me crazy. He knows full well that old fishermen are not right in the head.
A king salmon splashes along a rocky slide.
There were cutthroats in western mountains and rainbows from northern rivers. My son netted a 17-inch brook trout for me and I held a canoe steady as he pulled a monster catfish from the Missouri River. Memories and nets, water beneath the bridge of time. Today, there is only an old man and a salmon.
I pull the king to the head of the pool. The current is fast and the rocks are steep. An old fisherman alone, pathetic net in tow; I grasp the water, watching the bend in the rod and feeling the strength on the end of the line. For a moment in time, my hand brushes timeless energy. I tried as best I could. I hold tight to the knowledge that if he were here, he would know what to do.
John Luthens is a freelance writer from Grafton, Wisconsin. His first novel, Taconite Creek, is available on Amazon or at www.cablepublishing.com or by contacting the author at Luthens@hotmail.com