My first fishing rod was a store bought one. I hounded Wally until he bought me a cheap one. I was disappointed because it wasn’t like the one that Edgar Smith had. I met Edgar on the school bus. He interfered when  the bullies were picking on me once so I trusted him.

One afternoon, I was walking on the north acre of the Smith farm when I saw Edgar and some of his friends fishing in Park Rill. When Edgar saw me standing on the bank above the creek he invited me to join them, which I did. The boys seemed to be having a lot of fun. I wanted to be part of that fun too, so Edgar taught me the rudiments of fishing.

I went home and told Wally that I wanted a rod and reel, line, a bobber, a weight, and hooks. He told me to go cut a rod out of the bush, but I insisted on a manufactured rod and eventually he bought it. Upon receiving my prize,which was a five foot rod, I set it all up, went and dug some worms and proceeded to the creek.I chose a site just above a beaver dam. I baited my hook and took my first cast. Now creek fishing and lake fishing are two different adventures. Creek fishing has far more hazards, and I encountered the first hazard with all the finesse of a raw amateur. The line which included the hook, the weight and the bobber all wound up in a bush which extended some six feet over the creek. That shrub shadowed a deep pool where the fish waited for food to drift past, so it was a perfect spot if I could just hit the water. After much tugging and fighting with the demon bush I got my gear free. On my second cast I caught it in a different hazard to my left.

I extracted that with much frustration, and finally got the hook in the water on the third attempt. Nothing happened so I moved to a different spot down stream close to another beaver dam. With the bobber I couldn’t determine if it was the current or a fish moving it, so I abandoned the bobber and the manufactured weight using only the weight of the worm to sink the hook. Then I draped my line over the slime that accumulated on the surface of the water. I usually gave the line a minute or so of twitching on the slime before I pulled it up. If I timed it just right there would be a trout on the hook.

I seemed to catch more debris than fish. Before the season finished I had broken the rod, tangled the line in the reel many times, and lost a good number of  hooks. Wally refused to buy me another rod. I went into the bush and cut a sturdy, thumb sized diameter willow, eight feet long, wrapped fifteen feet of line around the end of it, attached a hook, and voila, my fishing rod! Once it dried out, it was difficult to break. I caught many trout with that pole and subsequent poles. I’ve never again felt the need to have a manufactured pole, but I’ve not fished in a lake either.