KylieHarley's Journal

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Chapter 3 Shootin’ Fish in a Barrel

The fall of 1989 the Berlin Wall came down, and I picked up a fishing rod again for the first time in 9 years – what I hoped would mark two remarkable events in my lifetime.  That September morning I woke up with a craving to get out of Northern Virginia. I grabbed my boyfriend, a good ole boy from Middleburg, Virginia and threw two fishing rods into the trunk of the car. Soon we were off to the Blue Ridge Mountains.  I spent my junior high school years going to church camp in Luray, Virginia so I headed in that general direction.  The camp was nestled in the skyline of Virginia with a beautiful lake, hiking trails and a natural artisan spring gurgling ice cold water from underneath the earth’s surface.  I drove from memory and soon pulled into the driveway of Caroline Furnace.  Being that it was fall, the campers were all gone and the buildings were left empty waiting for various church retreats to occupy the cabins over the next several months. 

Tony and I exited the car and tip toed around the parking lot looking for someone to tell us to get lost because we were trespassing.  We whispered to each other that the coast looked clear.  Why we were whispering in the middle of nowhere with no one around is beyond me but it seemed like the right thing to do.  After a deep breath, I took his hand and lead him down the trail to the lake.  The leaves hadn’t begun to turn yet but it was still a crisp September morning.  Walking down the path brought me back to the summer of 1981 and Kevin Bartholomew – a moppy-headed junior counselor who kissed me on the shores of the lake one night when we took a walk during “free time”.  The camp canoes were still lined up on the shore like colorful fish on a dock, and I thought of the trip I took down the Shenandoah River in one of those canoes 8 years earlier.  The cattails surrounded the lake and you could still hear the same frogs I used to fall asleep to at night from a nearby tent.

After our tour of the lake, we made our way to the artisan spring that was tucked away off a meadow surrounded by large elm trees.  As we walked through the meadow, I recalled a game of Lord of the Rings that the entire camp played one night in teams.  The campers ranged in age from 6-14, and this was one game that everyone could participate in where age was irrelevant.  Much like a scavenger hunt, teams were required to go from location to location looking for clues throughout the campground.  As my team entered the meadow that evening at dusk, a young boy’s screams pierced the open air.  We watched in horror as this blond eight year old boy was engulfed in a mass of bees.  He had stepped on a nest in the ground and the bees swarmed his little body until he collapsed.  A senior counselor, a big barreling man called Brad, scooped him up and ran down the road into the setting sun.  I don’t know what happened to him but I never saw him the rest of the week.  I shook the unpleasant image out of my head and came back into present day; proceeding through the field. 

The spring was just as I remembered it – a small alcove in a mass of trees with clumps of watercress growing wild along its borders.  The sandy bottom gurgled with bubbles as the stream came to life from underneath the ground.  Much like a miner searching for gold, you could scoop handfuls of sand, sift them through your fingers and find pieces of Indian pottery from when the native Americans would come to the stream to fill up their water jugs.  Many times the pots would break on the rocks and the pieces of shattered pottery would get buried below the surface.  Over time, the natural spring burped the pieces back to the surface and this provided hours of entertainment for the campers.  The spring was also ice cold – so cold we would have contests on who could hold their hand under it the longest – many times until our fingers turned blue. 

Tony and I scooped the ice cold water into our mouths and grinned as it dripped down our chins.  “You can’t buy this in a bottle at 7/11,” he said.  I shook my head in agreement and picked up a piece of pottery from the sandy bottom and put it in my pocket. 

We headed back to the car amazed that already two hours had passed since we pulled into the parking lot.  Slightly hungry but not ready to put our adventure on hold, we continued down the winding road taking us away from the campground.  Something triggered Tony’s memory and he said “I know where we are, and I have a great idea” and with that, he pulled out the map from under the seat.  Within a matter of minutes, we were headed east, and I had no idea what was up his sleeve.

In the three months that Tony and I had been seeing each other, I begged him constantly about taking me fishing.  After all, he lived in a small town where a great fishing stream ran right on the outskirts of town.  The closest he came was bringing home a bushel of crabs from the downtown wharf one night in August. 

Soon he told me to take a left off the paved road and we started down a dusty, gravel driveway that sported a sign Pence Fish Farm.  Well pulled up to the main building and Tony got out and shook an older gentleman’s hand who was standing on the front porch.  He pointed to me, pulled out his wallet and came to the window to tell me to pop the trunk.  He pulled out the fishing rods and the older gentleman re-appeared with what looked like a receipt, a cheap Styrofoam cooler and a container of worms buried in dirt.  I scrunched my nose up at the sight of the big, fat crawlers all tangled among one another covered in top soil.  The two men laughed at me and Tony said “Don’t worry you’ll be baitin’ your own hook before you know it.”  Ugh – just the thought made my empty stomach turn.  He wasn’t serious was he? 

We walked down a small path towards a two acre pond.  Other fishermen lined the banks in various stages of casting, reeling and catching fish.  I watched them as Tony prepared our rods to be cast.  He told me to watch carefully as he expertly drove the hook into the body of the wriggling worm and pulled it out the other side.  The worm, still alive, curled and arched at the unpleasantness of having a hook through its body.  “OK darlin’, your turn,” and he offered up the container of creepy crawlies.  There was no getting out of this. If I didn’t do it, he would never take me fishing again so I dug my fingers into the dirt and pulled out what I was sure was the biggest, fattest worm of all.  It pulsed between my fingers and curled around my fingertips.  I took the hook with my other hand and just as I had seen Tony do minutes before, I plunged the hook into the worm’s body.  It jolted slightly so I quickly pulled the hook through the other side and proudly produced my baited hook.  Tony beamed and handed me his handkerchief to wipe the worm slim/dirt off my fingers.  He seamlessly cast the rod into the pond and handed it back to me to hold.  He then cast his own and the two of us sat down on the manicured banks of the trout pond.  I watched in wonder as everyone around me pulled in trout after trout.  It seemed effortless to them.  Soon, Tony’s rod was bouncing and he pulled in a pretty rainbow trout that glistened in the sunlight.  He quickly pulled the hook out of the fish’s mouth and dropped it into the cooler. The fish hit the cooler and flopped around for several minutes until the air left its body.  The sound of the fish slowly dying didn’t really disturb me but the fact that Tony had caught a fish before me was kind of pissing me off.

I sat watching the bobber on top of the water, waiting for it to be pulled under as Tony baited another worm on his hook.  Again, he cast his rod out into the pond and within minutes, he had another bite.  Me, not even a nibble.  I reeled my line in to see if my worm was even still on the hook and sure enough, there we was, still wriggling around.  Back in the water went Tony and my lines.  Ten minutes passed and soon Tony was reeling in his THIRD fish. What the hell? What was I doing wrong.  I was standing right next to him, using the same rod, the same bait, the same everything he was using and HE was catching all the fish.  I could see the smirk on Tony’s lips and it just made me want to smack him in the mouth.  He found it amusing that he was catching all the fish, and I had nothing but a worm on a hook.  Asshole.

Soon it seemed like I was surrounded by people all cheering at their catch.  People to the left, people to the right, casting their lines in and within moments, pulling in trout after trout.  I reeled in my line, threw out my old worm and replaced it with a fresh one in hopes this one would wriggle better, smell better, do something better.  Tony pulled in his 4th fish and we hadn’t even been there 45 minutes.  I could feel the frustration build up inside – patience had never been a strong suit of mine. 

When Tony pulled up his 7th fish in an hour, I threw the rod down, stomped back up the path to the parking lot, threw open my car door and threw myself behind the steering wheel.  I jammed the keys in the car, turned on the radio and crossed my arms, pouting, waiting for him to join me.  The tears started to come.  I hated fishing.  Who needed it?  It was a stupid sport.  It wasn’t even really a sport.  Just an excuse to drink beer near a body of water.  Stupid fish.  Stupid boys.  Stupid worms. 

Soon Tony came up the path with his rods, leftover worms and his cooler full of trout.  As hard as he tried, he couldn’t hide the smile on his face – he was amused by my little temper tantrum.  My flare for the dramatic hadn’t waned in 22 years, it had only gotten better.  He loaded up the rods in the trunk and put the cooler in the back seat. 

“Are you gonna be ok honey?”

“Don’t honey me you fish monger.”

I pulled out of the parking lot steaming.  This time I vowed I never wanted to go fishing again.  Ever.  My 22 year old mind had better things to do.  My 22 year old mind was hungry.  My 22 year old mind hated big, fat, worms in dirt.  My 22 year old mind worried, how come I couldn’t shoot a fish in a barrel?