Fishermen

How about a real good yarn, a true one, about two younger men, one who wears pink tennis shoes and pink outer wear, the other who chews tobacco and walks around holding a beaverwood staff? Sure why not? As Isak Dinesen wrote, “The only imaginative writing that interests me is writing that illuminates the magic of life.” Or something to that effect.

These dudes exude some interesting magic of life. They live in a disheveled RV Park on the Secret Coast. They do not work. They do not own a vehicle. They often drink 32-ounce Dr. Peppers. They decorate rocks with wonderful illustrations of woodland creatures. How they ended up here is a total mystery, perhaps even to themselves. One receives disability, perhaps of the existential kind. He’s the breadwinner.

They like to fish. They didn’t know a lick about fishing until moving here. They bought some poles and rode the bus to the river or lake and fished for salmon or trout. They also walked to the beach and fished for surf perch. They learned through trial and error, observation, and asking questions. They improved and started catching fish, cleaning them at a station, bringing them back to the park on the bus or walking them home in a bucket. Then they fried the fish up for supper. Huck Finn couldn’t have done it any better.

The virus struck. The bus would only transport people for medical appointments, not fishing. The breadwinner somehow arranged for his caregiver to come over, pick up the two men, drive them to the fishing spots, and then pick them up in a couple of hours. If they caught fish, the caregiver gave the fish a ride home, too.

It was all perfectly legal, a unique form of care giving, quite possibly unique in the annals of care giving, and totally hard core Oregon.

One day, the chew man landed a monster trout from a lake while fishing from a steep bank. He went to reel the beast in and it damn near pulled him into the water. Then, the pole snapped!

He needed a new pole, so he asked a crank living in the park, the weird man who collected beaverwood, if he could pick out a choice cut for a new fishing pole. The crank was delighted to help. In short order, they found the perfect pole.

So in the coming days, two Oregon men will be chauffeured at taxpayer expense in some sort of therapeutic exercise for one of them, to the river and lake, quite possibly the ocean as well, and one man will fish for salmon, trout or perch using a fishing pole made from 100% certified, GRADE A, organic, Oregon beaverwood.

You see, it was a good story.