The Junk Yard Fishermen

BIG BLACK

This morning as I watched them pull off, I was reminded of a similar day not so very long ago. Same truck, same boat, same team of fishermen. Daybreak caught Big Black, loaded to the gills, (pun intended) riding out, for a day of fishing.

Except this time, there was one minor difference. This time, the teacher, the Daddy, the mentor, was the guest. The passenger. The "buddy" who was asked to go fishing. Mims  has never been very good about being the follower. The one who walks a step behind. The one not in charge. But that day, as today, he was all of those things.

That day after their return, well into the latter part of the day, a conversation about his day transpired. As we moved back and forth on the glider, the words of emotion came tumbling out of Mims and I just sat, rocked, and listened.

Mims began to recite memories from long ago. Standing on bank side with fishing poles at old Mr. Marcus's pond on Hwy 65. Zach was maybe six years old or so. Mims didn't have anything but a little old tug boat with a trolling motor back then. We had all been out in it a few times, but Zach had gotten bigger and was no longer small enough to sit on a cooler between the two of us, so that little boat had been retired. So, as I said, they had taken to bank side fishing at ponds. Never catching very much, but always spending good quality time with one another.

As time moved on, we did buy another boat. A bass boat we could all go out in, but still really just comfortable for two. Zach lost interest in fishing for a few years, so it was mostly Mims and I who took that boat out on any regular basis.

But then, Zach attains his driver's license. And suddenly there is not a pond, a lake, a mine hole, or swimming hole that he doesn't hit a lick at. The little tug boat comes back out of retirement, and man alive, the places that little boat has been in the past year. Zach and his buds's go everywhere and anywhere with that boat. Load it up in the back of somebody's truck and they are off, for their next adventure.

Never thinking his Daddy would be very interested in going out in that little tug boat, not when he had a nice fancy bass boat here at the house, Zach never asked his Daddy to go with him. And then he did. As they pulled out that Easter Sunday morning, it was the first time with son driving and Daddy as passenger.

Now obviously, there were some Easter Sunrise services going on, and as part of the story, this of course was relayed back to me. As they road down Attapulgus HWY, in Big Black, with that tug boat hanging out the back, they happened upon one of those services. Big Black itself is not all that loud, but the huge tires are, and it sure was quiet until they rode by all those people on that church lawn in their Sunday best, looking like the second coming of Fred Sanford in that pick up truck with the boat cocked sideways in the back.

But the sentiment is what got me during that conversation. Mims relayed all the memories of taking Zach here and there, but said he never thought about how strange it was going to be to sit on the other side of a vehicle and have his son, take him fishing. That as they drove, he would glance over at Zach every now and again and wonder where had all the time gone and how in the world did we get to this place so fast. Where was that three year old little boy, who jumped off porches in cowboy boots, that he met when we first moved here, or the five year old who pumped his skinny little legs as hard as they would go when he played tee-ball, and the seven year old who jumped to the sky on his bike ramps.

Mims is not much for mush and gush. But I could tell those feelings had been weighing on him for the better part of that day. So this morning when I saw them pulling out, I wondered, would today feel the same for Mims, or would this, too, be old school by now, and just the way it is supposed to be.

As I walked back inside, and went about my chores for the morning, my mind drifted back to his Sanford and Son reference from a couple of months ago. And it wasn't long before I caught myself humming the theme song, and smiling to myself thinking about those big old tires bouncing up and down, all the way down Attapulgus Hwy, one more time.