Читать книгу Never Cry Halibut - Bjorn Dihle - Страница 12

RETURN OF THE PRODIGAL FISHERMAN

MY DAD DID EVERYTHING RIGHT to raise his three sons to be fishermen. He taught us to spin cast, troll, fly-fish, and halibut fish during outings that generally involved hours of untangling lines and existential crises. Quite frequently on these fishing expeditions, I was convinced I was tottering on the edge of hypothermia and perhaps even death. When I whimpered, my dad would try to set me straight.

“You don’t know how lucky you are,” he’d say over the pouring rain and howling wind, a string of cohos over his shoulder, me sniveling and shivering in tow. “When I was your age, I walked miles to the dam on the Sacramento River to catch twelve-inch hatchery trout.”

Dad’s diligent, often frustrating labor paid off for the most part. His love for fishing passed on to my two brothers, who put in their hours each year. My older brother, Luke, enjoys fishing so much, he’ll even cast for humpies and chums—he eats them too. My little brother, Reid, told me the other day he might enjoy fishing more than hunting, which is the most controversial statement I’ve ever heard him make. Every family has its black sheep, and in regards to fishing, I guess it was me.

My career as a fisherman began as bright and hopeful as my brothers’. I tangled just as many lines—and perhaps even more. I got pretty good at being hypothermic, something to this day I’m proud of. I got in the way when my dad was trying to net, contributing to the loss of several king and coho salmon. I massacred fillet jobs, cut myself, and broke knives. I dropped valuables over the edge of the skiff and lost hundreds of dollars’ worth of lures and gear. I’m not sure if my dad was relieved or disappointed when I declined his offers to go fishing during my teenage years. Soon my mom put my poles in the mysterious, carnivorous underbelly of the house. They vanished, along with all other outdoor gear that had ever been stored there.

Somehow, perhaps out of pity or desperation on the part of the captains who hired me, I started crewing on a number of commercial fishing boats. Now I was getting paid to be soaking wet and hypothermic, plus tangle lines, lose gear, and get in the way. Some of my favorite times were based out of Elfin Cove, longlining on the Njord for halibut in Cross Sound with Joe and Sandy Craig. The first May I worked for them was rife with gale warnings and stormy seas.

“I hired a Jonah!” I heard Joe muttering as we tossed about, trying to snag the buoys attached to one side of our set. The fishing was slow, so the three of us got to spend a lot of time yelling, swearing, and bonding. One of my duties was to relay directions and curses between Joe, who was situated in the stern, and Sandy, who was driving in the wheelhouse. It was like the commercial fishing version of the game Telephone.

“Look,” Sandy had warned me on the first day we met, “when we’re out fishing, you’re going to hear Joe and me yell a lot of horrible things at each other. We still love each other; it just gets a little stressful at times. I’m sorry that you’ll often be the go-between for the two of us.”

I didn’t mind though. Whenever we snagged a set on the rocky sea floor, I got a chance to blow off some steam and work on my improv, adding a little extra drama and profanity to their warnings at each other.

One afternoon, after we’d finished up with their halibut quota, we decided to take the skiff out to Port Althorp and troll for a king. The sudden transition from working with hundreds of hooks to just one left me with that same drowsiness I got toward the end of my days of going fishing with my dad. I was half-asleep when Joe and Sandy started yelling, the line on the reel began zinging, and the spasmodic pole was shoved into my hands. They’d trolled these waters for nearly forty years and caught thousands of kings, but for the next five minutes, with all their whooping and hollering, I could have believed this was their first.

“There’s nothing better in life than catching king salmon,” Joe said as we admired the rainbow-scaled salmon. We barbecued a chunk on a cedar plank, and I embarked on a path of seafood snobbery.

Besides getting wet and hypothermic, tangling lines, and getting in the way of angry captains, there were other benefits to commercial fishing. A lot of folks who normally wouldn’t have thought much of me but suffered some romantic notions about commercial fishermen gave me much more respect than I deserved. I used my “Don’t worry, I’m a commercial fisherman” trick to fool MC, who’d recently moved to Alaska, into hanging out with me. She denies it, but I think dating a commercial fisherman was on her bucket list. I got her hooked on seafood, and she hasn’t been able to shake me since. Things got a bit rough when she discovered the true extent of my fishing skills.

“I can’t wait to catch my first salmon!” she exclaimed when she visited in Elfin Cove. On a day off, I borrowed Joe and Sandy’s skiff and took her to the head end of Port Althorp. Thousands of humpies were milling and splashing in the shallows, waiting for the tide to rise so they could swim upriver and spawn. Armed with a quarter-ounce pixie, I was sure she’d have a fish the first cast. Two hours later, we were still fishless. She looked at me, quietly judging, as humpies leaped out of the water in every direction. On the way back to Elfin Cove, I pointed out whales, sea otters, a derelict cannery, glaciers, and mountains, but she seemed uninterested. Bob-o, one of the most hardcore fisherman in the Cross Sound fleet, tried to make me feel better.

“Ah, I can’t catch anything with a fishing pole either,” he said, which I appreciated even though I highly doubted it.

“Look, MC, commercial fishing and sport fishing are two different arts,” I tried to explain.

“Maybe someone else could help me catch my first salmon?” she teased.

A wild Southeast Alaskan king salmon.

The next year for her birthday, she wanted a salmon pole and to go fishing and kayaking. I paddled a double kayak out to an island as she trolled a Flying-C with a focus so intense I was at first amused and then frightened. After three hours of paddling and no fish, she continued casting while I set up the tent and gathered beach wood for a fire. Finally she caught a small Dolly Varden, and was satiated enough to enjoy some birthday cake. We went fishing a few more times, catching sea slugs, sculpins, and small Dolly Varden before I knew had to go to my dad and ask a favor.

“I think MC might leave me if she doesn’t catch a salmon soon. Do you think you could take her the next time you go out?” I asked. He happily agreed, and of course they went out and caught a pile. When she came home that night, we cooked a salmon dinner and put the rest of her catch in a brine.

“I caught a smoker load!” She beamed. “I can take you fishing your next day off, if you want.”

I began to steal out in the predawn hours, borrowing her rod and then sneaking it back before she woke. These forays were partially inspired by wounded pride, but I soon found myself enjoying standing on the ocean’s edge, casting in the morning solitude, and quietly chanting, “I am not a Jonah. I am not a Jonah.”

I rarely caught much, but folks seemed more at ease around me now that I’d picked the rod back up. My dad and brothers started inviting me out on their skiff to go to their secret halibut holes; old friends called wanting to know if I wanted to go try for some cohos.

In late July of 2012, with my brothers and MC, we tried for halibut in Lynn Canal. The ocean stretched blue and undulated gently, mountains rose to nearly seven thousand feet in a couple miles, and glaciers cut through rainforest like giant frozen rivers. A pod of Dall’s porpoises played with our skiff, bumping lines as we jigged. Humpback whales plied the waters with gargantuan baleen-plaited mouths spread wide. Bald eagles, gulls, sea ducks, and a host of other birds revolved in and out of vision.

“We don’t know how lucky we are.” My dad’s words escaped me as I quelled the sudden urge to tangle my line and throw my pole overboard. MC and my brothers didn’t reply. They were too busy waiting for a fish to strike.