MetroCreative

There’s a traditional ritual I go through about this time each year.

In between the first day of spring and the last Saturday in April opening day of trout season, I go through my tackle bag to reorganize and restock depleted items.

I am sure this idea sounds as interesting to some readers as reorganizing a sock drawer or counting a pile of spilled toothpicks, but to me, it’s never boring.

I hide myself away down in the basement, maybe on a Saturday afternoon, sitting at the work bench or on the floor with my fishing bag in front of me.

I turn on the radio and almost immediately I get lost in my own little world – a place where the past, present and future mix together delightfully, like chocolate and vanilla swirled ice-cream.

According to a baby book my parents kept for me, the first time I went fishing I was 3 years old. I recall vaguely having a plastic kids’ fishing pole.

I also recall being excited to go to a church bazaar with my mom after hearing they were going to have a fishing pond. I didn’t know it was a game where you would “fish” for prizes over a curtain.

Behind the curtain, helpers would tie prizes to your line.

One of the most vivid memories I have is seeing the shiny, black surface of the river’s water with its floating foam.

I was sitting down in the grass next to my dad as he fished downstream of a waterfall, trying to catch trout with a hook baited with a worm, tied to the end of some thick, black fishing line.

My mom was there too, trying her own luck fishing.

When my dad did catch a fish, it was the first time I had ever seen a brook trout.

It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I recall the somewhat metallic smell of the fish and saw its big eyes and frowning mouth. At home, we ate the fish after frying them in a pan with flour and butter.

I was taught to eat the tails, which were crunchy and tasty.

I have been hooked on trout fishing ever since.

Down in the basement, the first thing I see in my bag is a snarl of monofilament fishing line, bunched up on itself, looking like a bird’s nest.

Late last fall, just before the fishing season ended, I snapped my line after snagging my lure on an underwater stump.

I wound the line around my hand and then threw it into my fishing bag to toss out once I got home. This is something I have a habit of doing, rather than leaving the discarded line out in the woods or in the water.

I was fishing along a river one time and a young boy was there too.

“Hey mister,” he said. “Can you help this bird.”

There was a gull with fishing line wrapped around one of its feet, essentially holding it down to the ground to starve or become prey to a predator. I had waders on and walked across the river to get to the gull.

I pulled some line clippers out of my bag. I had to take several tries while talking softly to the gull before it calmed down long enough to stop trying to bite me and let me snip the line.

Another time, I was in a canoe and saw some fishing line hanging down from a branch along the edge of the river. I pulled on the line to bring it to the surface. At the end of it was a dead robin that had also had its feet entangled in somebody’s discarded fishing line.

After these incidents, I always bring any snapped or discarded line home that I can. I also cut the plastic rings out of plastic six-pack containers to render them harmless to birds and other wildlife.

There is a wide range of items in my shoulder bag that I carry fishing with me, ranging from old prescription bottles I keep hooks, sinkers and swivels in, a fillet knife and several plastic boxes of lures I have organized by type to bobbers, hook pullers and a tape measure.

I love to use various spinners and spoons for trout and so I have all types. Panther Martins, Rooster Tails and Mepps, with a wide variety of blade colors and patterns of dots or signature blade shapes.

I see that a couple of the tray sections are low on some of my favorite lures.

I look to my fishing pole that stands in the corner to see which lure is tied onto the line. It’s a deep running spinner that helped me pull four trout from a chilly creek in short order on the last day of the season.

It was a great day of fishing. The weather was nice with more than a hint of autumn in the air. The skies were piercing blue with wispy streaks of cirrus clouds – early harbingers of the winter that was yet to come.

I go to the shelf to get replacement lures. When I do, I see old and worn fishing gear sitting there. There are a couple of old basket-type creels, bait-casting reels from a long time ago and one of the old, worm bait cans that secure to your side by running a belt through slots at the back of the can.

This stuff was my dad’s that I’ve saved.

He died in 2008. If he was still here today, he’d be turning 97 in June.

How can it be that 15 years has passed since he died? I still miss him so much and hurt like his funeral was yesterday.

I have a lot of his fishing tackle, but I don’t often use it. I have attached a type of sacredness to these things. Even if I don’t use the stuff, I want it near me. I want it safe.

I am putting together some small tackle boxes for my grandkids, hoping they might keep, cherish and use the little lures inside when I’m long gone.

The same is true for fishing tackle I plan to leave to my brother and my boys, including the things I’ve saved that were my dad’s.

On the work bench, there’s a small pile of brand-new lures all still in their wrapping. Some of these are more of my favorite lures, but others are new lures I’ve never tried out before.

I’ve heard it said, and I believe it to some extent, that fishing lures are designed and painted in various colors and patterns to hook the angler before they ever hook a fish.

My insides are spinning as I float on a cloud of excitement for the coming chance to fish again soon. I think about all the favorite haunts I want to revisit, but I also envision taking my old Jeep out on some new roads.

New to me anyway. I will spend a good deal of time poring over topographic maps and aerial photos, looking for new places to wet a line. All this planning and preparation builds the anticipation.

My fishing buddy and I start a countdown to opening day not long after the new year turns over. We’re both usually starting to get itchy and squirmy about this time, because we are just about a month away from that big day with the red marker circle around it on the calendar.

With my bag refilled with all the necessary items, I put a new spool of line on my reel and retie the lure. I’m ready now.

I enjoy this time to reconnect with what is now a longstanding fishing tradition for me. I enjoy paying tribute to the great times I’ve had fishing in the past with family, friends and all alone.

I know the peace, beauty, movement, sound and wonder found out there on a river are things that collectively hold tremendous power to strengthen, revitalize and restore my winter-ravaged heart, mind and soul.

I might be found wandering down a grassy hillside to the river alone, but I will be taking everyone I’ve ever fished with along with me in my heart.

Down to the waterline I’ll go. Fish or no fish, I’ll come back a better man.

Outdoors North is a weekly column produced by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources on a wide range of topics important to those who enjoy and appreciate Michigan’s world-class natural resources of the Upper Peninsula.