Tom likes fishing, except when he doesn’t..
The thing about fishing is that those times of the year that favour a full bag are usually the ones that aren’t favourable to filling it. Like the change of seasons from autumn to winter, when the warmish autumn north-easters swing around to the colder south. Like today as Tom starts to unpack his kit against the boardwalk wall.
I’m just taking a walk, heading his way, watching.
A sudden gust of wind kidnaps Tom’s hat and spins it into the river, he’s had it for years and if you’ve not a fisherman then you don’t realise the importance of having a recognisable fishing hat. One all his friends recognise from a distance, this is a necessary fishing factor because the one thing a fisherman doesn’t want is having a couple of old mates rolling up to share his luck. That’s why Tom’s hat has a small badge attached to it, something he picked up at the local bait shop years ago. It says Fuck Off!. This they understand. This they do.
Tom likes fishing for blackfish, likes the routine of keeping them alive inside a submerged hessian bag attached by a rope to to a protruding nail on one of the boardwalk bollards. Later he will kill, bleed, scale and fillet them before taking the catch home in a white plastic bucket that also serves as his seat. Like his hat, he’s had the bucket for years.
Local kids on e-bikes are strangers to the fishing game and the only thing they have in common with Tom is that they also like to use the boardwalk, but unlike the almost stationary fisherman they like to use him and his scattered gear as a challenge. Two things about e-bikes, they are silent and the local kids like to gun them up to about 40kph. Totally illegal but massively tempting.
Coming at ya.
So here’s Tom waving goodbye to to his hat when one of the kids misreads his approach to the fisherman, hits Tom’s white plastic bucket and spins it into the water. A hoot of laughter then and as all four of the ruthless little bastards ride over Tom’s forty year old split cane rod which he unwisely left lying on the boardwalk. Then the rain started. The sky darkened and thunder rolled out a warning, and of course Tom’s waterproof jacket, packed securely in the white plastic bucket with his lunch has joined his hat and is now mid-river.
And the last thing Tom heard as packed up what was left of his gear was a yell of delight as one his mates happily brandished a dinner for four sized blackfish.
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