Modern

He had snuck out of the cabin early. His father was on one of his multi-day ranting sprees again and it was just too much. The was supposed to be a vacation. He was supposed to be relaxing and not dealing with the stress of other people.

He sat on a fallen log, overlooking the river’s edge. There was no other sound but the water telling secrets to itself and squirrels spreading the gossip of a human appearing at the river.

He sat in the relative stillness for some time. Willing himself to forget about the classes, with the slacker students always asking for notes. With the activists students always berating him for choosing study over marching. With the willfully ignorant challenging the presented history no matter how well documented that history is.

It was that last rant that he made the mistake of sharing with his father. His father began telling him of the intentional whitewashing of Native American Indian history, his history, and how even now his father is unable to connect with his Native American Indian bloodkin because of being taken away and placed in a foster home by some bullshit government directive.

He knew the details. He understood his father’s pain. But that clock couldn’t be turned back. “Ancient history”, he had said to his father. The resulting emotional explosion was what drove him to come to the river, empty of fish.

As he looked over what he brought with him, he realized he had grabbed the wrong gear. Wrong pole, wrong fliers, and wrong line. The salmon run was long over. Not even corpses for the bears to fight over.

He went through the motions anyway. Selecting the flies. Tying the hook. Standing on the log and casting the empty hook into the empty river.

The motion calmed him. He found it to be a meditation in its own right. Standing carefully on the mossy log, he practiced casting and recalling, over and over. Motion became as fluid as the river that coached him. Time became irrelevant.

He realized he too was wounded by his father’s forced adoption. The choices of a nameless bureaucrat had cut him off from a wealth of family history. Granted, most of it was ancient tales handed down, but it was still a wealth denied him.

He reflected sadly on that for a few castings. His inattention spurred him to shift a foot slightly. He slipped on the damp moss and fell into the embracing water of the cold river. As he pulled himself and his fishing rod, out of the water, the river sounded to him as bubbling with laughter.

Sitting back on the log that betrayed him, he joined in the mirth. It felt good to laugh. Good to let go. Good to just be, even though he was dripping wet and chilled.

“Okay, I get it. Task at hand and shit.” He removed his soaked shirt and spread it on the sun-warmed bank to dry. He stood once more on the treacherous log, and resumed the physical meditation of dry casting.

The gentle motion again gave him peace of spirit. He had set out with no set restriction of time. Only that he needed time to himself. He knew he had been at the log for a few hours. It felt like he had just arrived. It felt like he had always been there.

Cast. Breathe. Pause. Listen. Recall. Feel. Pause. Be. The actions cycled in a life of their own. Cast. Breathe. Pause. Listen. Recall. Feel… a tug?

He stopped reeling in the empty hook. Another tug. He pulled sharply on the rod, thinking he had snared some under water hazard. In response, a bright flash of color broke the river’s calm facade.

He stared at the vivid orange gleam in shock. “A salmon?” He reeled in more line and was rewarded with more flashes from the large fish. “A salmon!”

He held no hopes of successfully reeling in the large fish. Despite being out of season, it was unusually large. His rod and line were rated far too low for the weight now tugging on them. He committed to finishing the fight, with no expectation of winning it. All he wanted, was to recover the hook.

Pull. Wait. Slack line. Pause. Reel in a little more line than what was released. Pause.

Little by little, he reeled in the fierce fish. Not with great jerks of motion. Not with grand sweeps pulling in this direction or that. But with small and gentle pulls that worked the salmon ever closer to him. As focused as he was on his intent, it did not escape him that this tactic could also be used to connect with his father.

He already counted the fish to be a loss. But what the river had taught him was far more valuable. All that was left was to recover the hook, and go rejoin his father.

A splash of cold water on his feet forced him to focus on the task once more. The salmon had been reeled to the bank. If he tried to life the large fish with the rod, the rod would snap for sure. To catch the fish, meant jumping into the water and grabbing the salmon by hand.

Pull. Wait. Grab line. Pull, and jump. The river received him gladly. At once, he was on top of the large salmon. As he stood up with his opponent in his arms, he expected the fish to thrash about.

The salmon only laid quietly in his bare arms. Quickly, he removed the hook from open mouth. Noting the rod had follen onto dry ground, he threw the hook after it.

And still, the fish did not fight against him. He looked it over, wondering if the fish had been wounded from a previous struggle. But only the marks of the day’s contest were visible.

“Are you a gift from the river?” He didn’t realize he had spoken out loud until he heard his voice echo from the log. The fish moved somewhat in his arms. He realized the gills were drying out. The fate of the salmon had been placed in his hands.

He placed the gasping salmon on the shore and returned with his fishing knife. A sudden sense of solemnity and reverence came over him. Following this new instinct, he spoke his gratitude to the river, for the lessons he had learned. And spoke his gratitude to the salmon, for the lesson it had taught him and the meal it will be to him and his father.

His words quickly and quietly spoken, he ended the struggle with the salmon. He sat there, beside the warming salmon, for a few minutes. Long enough to hear the gentle rush of deep breathing behind him.

He turned to find his father sitting under a tree. The older man was sitting close enough to see, and hear, all that happened, but not so close to be a distraction. His father had brought two rods and more gear with him. He knew the rucksack, now serving as his father’s armrest, held beer, water, and snacks. Though his father was in the shade, he could see the old man’s tears plainly.

“Dad? How long have you been sitting there?” He looked down at his gift from the river. “You can take it easy today. I have dinner, and maybe tomorrow’s lunch.”

“What lesson did you thank the river for?” His father, not one for small talk, went straight to the point.

“Why were you crying just now?” For once, he decided to take his father’s tactic.

“Because I just watched my son, my modern son, take part in an ancient way. And I thought I would never see that. Ever.” He wiped tears from his face. “And you?”

The younger man found his own face washed with fresh and sudden tears. “I learned, I have a lot to learn. And that I need to slow down if I’m going to learn it from you.”

“Well.” His father took a deep breath, banishing the last of the tears. “I suppose we should get started then. I’ll get your rod and hook. You wrap up the salmon in your shirt and carry it that way.” His moment of perceived weakness over, his father stood up and began putting his plan into action without pause.

Wordlessly, he followed his father’s directions. Only now did he realize it was late afternoon. He was more sunburnt than tanned. A minor price to pay for such a valuable day.

They had came to the river separately. They left together. They had came with the intent of many words. They left silently.

And the river babbled on in the silence of their leaving. Speaking secrets known only to itself.

Make of that, what you may.

(This post written for, and inspired by, Sunday Scribblings #308: “Modern“.)