The Fishing Trip
By Hal Haralson and David Haralson
"I would like to become a writer. How do I begin?"
The young woman who stood before me appeared to be 16 or 17 years of age. She was very serious about becoming a writer.
I told her I wanted her to do something for me. "Select an event that made you very happy, or very sad. Take a word picture of that event, write it down and show it to me."
"Don`t worry about writing for publication. That may happen or it may not. A wonderful teacher named David Redding told me to `write from the lump in my throat.` The important thing is that you capture the event so it can be passed on to others."
My first story was written almost 30 years ago. It is about a trip taken into the Colorado Mountains with my ten-year-old son, Brad. This story was published in the June 1996 issue of Christian Ethics Today.
I ended the story by stating, "I learned something from this trip about being alone with my son, about doing something special with only one of them."
David, my other son, was five years of age at that time. He was promised a trip of his own when he became 10.
I never wrote about that trip. I wondered what he would remember if he wrote about it thirty years later.
I was overwhelmed at his insight, at the detail, about what was important.
I think you will be moved, as I was.
David`s Story at Age 34
I was going to be 10 years old. While this does not seem to be such a big deal as I near my 35th birthday, it meant the world to me then. Jews have a bar mitzvah; we had our tenth birthday. For years I had heard the story of my older brother and father hiking and fly fishing in the Colorado mountains on his tenth birthday. They explored an abandoned mining town and mine, fished remote streams, and trudged through powder snow. Though we shared many weekend fishing trips together, the three of us, I still carried envy in my heart for their time alone. It would soon be my turn.
As a boy I lived to fish. This love has only slipped to the background because I now live to be a good husband and father. So it was not surprising that I chose a bass fishing trip for my special birthday. I don`t know why Sam Rayburn Reservoir was chosen. It certainly did not reflect any allegiance to the long deceased Speaker of the House from our great state of Texas, as I had never even heard of him by that age. Most likely it was the hottest body of water in the fishing lore of the day. Whatever the reason, the site was picked, the guide contacted, and the trip was on.
As a boy on the verge of puberty, I had few distractions to impede the exhilaration of anticipating our arrival. Those who have been on similar outdoor excursions know that the planning is half the fun. Maps are bought, articles are read, old gear is pulled out and cleaned, new gear is purchased. All of this adds to the sense of heightened expectation. Our approaching moment involved several hours drive in the family`s silver Honda Accord from the hill country of Austin to the piney woods of East Texas.
I had never seen trees so big. The best one can hope for in my home environment are the seven-foot scrub cedars and an occasional twenty-foot oak. These pines were over fifty feet tall and towered over my barely five foot frame. I followed every crossroad and small town on the map with bated breath. As we crossed the first bridge and I looked across the expanse of water, visions of Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior flashed before my eyes. This was a far cry from our weekend outings on Onion Creek.
We met our guide the first morning and set off in his rig across the glassy water. The sun rose in radiant splendor while I tried my first topwater lure. Visions of the elusive five-pound bass filled by head as I made the first cast. We caught a few fish and my father and I were introduced to a new way of fishing. Neither of us had used a rubber worm with great effectiveness, but our guide was a good teacher. I tried one later that morning near a weed bed off the shoreline. My line landed on the opposite side and had not fully reached the bottom when it caught and raced from my reel. By the none-to-familiar high-pitched squeal of the drag on my Zebco, I knew I had hooked by big one. But the moment was short lived when the line snapped and he swam to freedom. Words cannot convey my heartbroken spirit, but Dad`s words of encouragement eased the pain. There was nothing to do but fish on.
We stayed the night in the single-room lodge with a double bed, my dad on one side and me on the other. I missed home and the comfort of my mother`s presence. But I was on the road to manhood, and mother`s apron strings were beginning to unravel. It was just us men.
The next day we went to the other side of the lake and plugged around a stump field with the "bone colored shad" topwaters our guide said would be so effective. His advice proved invaluable as we reeled in one keeper after another. I was in ecstasy. They my trance was broken when I retrieved my lure to find a three-foot alligator gar swimming close behind. My heart skipped a beat as I yelled in surprise. He was there one moment and gone the next, just another memory for my burgeoning account.
The pinnacle event occurred late that day as I followed the screeches of the birds overhead to witness a bald eagle plummet to the water and snatch a fish in his talons. I held my breath as he soared heavenward only to be bombed by a pair of osprey in hot pursuit. One bird continued the attack and the eagle dropped the fish to turn and defend himself. The other swooped and caught the flailing fish as it rocketed toward the earth. The eagle had nothing, the osprey`s had their meal, and I had the story of a lifetime.
We ended the trip with over forty legal bass. My father still has the pictures of us next to the lodge in front of our quarry. There are also some shots of me with rod in hand concentrating intently on my line. I don`t know who came away richer. My father got to take his last son on the mementous tenth birthday trip. I got to spend my passage to manhood with the man I love most. It was the last time I remember using my old Zebco. Soon after, Dad purchased my first Ambassador bait-caster and I have never looked back. But the birthday tradition lives on.
My daughter turned ten over a year ago, and with my urging her mother planned a Victorian Tea Party hosted by her and my mother complete with self-adorned bonnets and gowns. I was touched to see them share that experience as my little girl made her step to womanhood. But in the back of my mind, I eagerly anticipate the day my two younger boys and I begin to plan the trips for their tenth birthdays.
"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. The commandments that I give to you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them upon your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up" (Dt 6:5-7, NIV). My father loves the Lord, as do I, and he witnessed to me through the time we spent that birthday. I pray that I will be able to show my sons that same love.
David Haralson, 2002
It is obvious that the passage of years does not reduce the significance of this trip taken. Both father and son share the memory of the trip to Lake Sam Rayburn. David writes well about this special time.
