My dad counted fish. He ENJOYED counting fish. To he fair, he counted everytying.
He was an avid bird watcher and bird watchers are counters. His life list came out to just shy of 2,000 birds and he would usually have binoculars with him as he was throwing a line for trout or steelhead or whatever he was fishing for.
He also calculated his own gas milage and would keep track of every tank, back when he could still drive.
He had little notebooks that he’d have on the water with him and he’d write down where he was fishing, who with and every fish hooked and landed. Like I said, he liked to count things.
There was May 18th (year not recorded) where he fished McCloud Reservoir with his friend Jack. He went 9/13, nothing too big. Fished about 4 hours.
There was a day with fished with Nick Denbow down in Mexico where he caught 3 fish and I caught a few. Dad’s notes say I had fish up to 30#, which is larger than I remember. I certainly did lose a few that day. Looks like it was a long day on the water. I don’t know if dad caught baby tarpon here or snook or jacks. Seems like he should have said what species, but he didn’t.
There was this epic day out on a private pond with his then-girlfriend, Solveig. Looks like he landed 17 and I can’t tell if at noon he landed a 20″er or a 28″er. I feel like he would have called if he caught a 28 inch fish, but maybe not.
There was this day, written down in this journal later from his little booklet. This was three days after my mom passed away from a short, brutal fight with cancer. We coped the best way we knew how. We went fishing. We fished with my friend Andrew (Confluence Outfitters). Andrew’s mom and my mom were roommates in college. We had one hell of a day. The fish were big and plentiful and the actions was fast enough to mask some of the loss. Looks like I had a couple over 20″ and several at that mark. That’s a fine, fine day of fishing with your dad and your friend.
With my dad’s passing, I don’t have anyone to take fishing (my son, yes, but we can’t just go piss off and fish for a couple of days). There is soccer practice. And work. And two games this weekend. And I’m the one who does the cooking.
But I made it out today for a bit. I haven’t been fishing the Bay much, but I needed to go fishing and I did. I even managed to catch a wayward halibut.
I was 1/1 today. Caught at about 10:14 AM in Alameda.
Long live the fish counters.
