Thursty Thursdays for Johnny WalleyeEl Pescador

Sundays are for mom and Thursdays are for dad.

I’m at a loss today. The only story that is coming to mind is a fishing trip we took over to the Wisconsin River one time when I was about 8 or 9.

I remember the car ride for some reason… me just looking out the window and watching different birds and then noticing how the landscape changed as we neared the river.

It was at least me, mom, dad, little brother, little sister and maybe one older sister.

One thing I remembered when I was real little fishing with my dad is that you didn’t complain and if he said, “sit still”, you sat still.

I can picture it in my mind so vividly. A warm, but not hot summer day. The sky was that cobalt blue with big, billowy white clouds, here and there with a breeze kicking around.

We piled out of the car and got busy getting fishing. I was big enough to put my own worm on and all that and to cast.

I remembered other fishing trips where I would walk around a lot looking for a perfect spot before sending the first cast out and also remembered dad saying, “sit still”.

I grabbed the first opening in the trees I could find and got to casting. I hit a snag the first time so I reeled it in and put it a little farther out into the current. I could feel the sinker hitting bottom and getting pulled downstream. I clicked the bail and felt the line get tight and bounce… once… twice… and it settled nicely and putting that good little bend in the tip of my fishing pole.

Dad said, “That’s good, now let it sit.” 

I remember that specifically. “That’s good, now let it sit.”

So I did.

I sat down and stared the paint off the tip of that fishing pole.

I don’t know how long I sat there but dad must have been watching. He came up and asked, “Any bites?”

“No”, I said, still staring at the rod tip… just in case.

He said, “Here let me show you, you have to move it, a little bit, once in awhile so they can find it.”

Here is why I remember this day. I sat there, like he said. I got to fishing, like he said. I sat still, like he said. And didn’t have a single bite, nada, zip, ziltch, bupkis! No runs, no hits and nobody on.

He takes my fishing pole and says, “Go like this once in awhile.” And he gently jigged the rod with just his wrist motion… once… twice… AND FISH ON!

On the second gentle motion he hooked a fish, just like that. He hands me the rod and says, “Reel it in.”

What the heck! I sat there for who knows how long and he just hooks a fish like that, WHAM! FISH ON!?!

What the… No way.

One of my brothers says that dad gave himself the nickname ‘Johnny Walleye’. Maybe so. But whenever I went fishing with him, or would stop and talk to him when I was older, and he was fishing off of the Dairy Queen bridge, that ol’ SOB would have a fish on.

And a couple in his green, five gallon bucket.