{"id":7333,"date":"2016-10-05T17:08:23","date_gmt":"2016-10-05T23:08:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/?page_id=7333"},"modified":"2016-10-05T17:08:23","modified_gmt":"2016-10-05T23:08:23","slug":"here-fishing","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/?page_id=7333","title":{"rendered":"Here Fishing"},"content":{"rendered":"

L. L. Madrid<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Every Sunday my grandfather fishes at Ripple Pond. It\u2019s an old habit, one anchored in boyhood. His mother allowed him to forgo church for fishing, as he was more contemplative by the water\u2019s edge.<\/p>\n

Today he\u2019s wearing a neon orange baseball cap, his favorite for the last four decades. He looks maybe sixty. His age varies from week to week. Sometimes he\u2019s as young as eight and others he\u2019s the old man I knew. Always though, a toothpick juts from the corner of his mouth, often bouncing as if conducting the current.<\/p>\n

During the initial sightings I confronted him, asking why he\u2019d come, but he never answered. He wouldn\u2019t even look at me. Instead, he\u2019d wind his reel; grab his tackle and leave, disappearing at the tree line. I\u2019ve spent six months of Sundays watching him fish.<\/p>\n

When I was a kid he brought me here a fistful of times. The first outing he had a can of live worms. I didn\u2019t want to bait the hook. The prospect of selecting a worm and impaling it was nauseating. Grandpa\u2019s blue eyes narrowed when I\u2019d asked him to skewer the bait for me. He spat, shook his head and said, \u201cYou got to do it yourself. Wouldn\u2019t be honest otherwise.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fingers pinching a worm, I slid the wriggling creature onto the hook, pricking my finger in the process. Grandpa nodded his approval and reached into the front pocket of his shirt and handed me a toothpick. We didn\u2019t speak again until after I got a nibble followed by a tug. A few cranks of the reel and I had a two-incher. Grandpa had me throw it back. It was my first catch and I wanted to keep it, but he insisted. My face went hot and words of protest bubbled inside me, but he offered up a rare smile and patted my back.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not about the catch,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen what\u2019s the point?\u201d<\/p>\n

He held a finger to his lips and then gestured out toward the undulating liquid, the shifting variegations of cola-brown, peridot, and slate blue.<\/p>\n

We grew comfortable sharing silence. Sitting side by side, our legs dangling from the dock as we both squinted at the sun like characters in a Rockwell painting. I contemplate those long-faded Sunday mornings, listing all the details I can conjure. The little yellow cooler. The entwining scents of pine and coffee. Feathered lures. Gooey orange bait. The whizzing, creaking whirl of the reel. There are neither hints nor harbingers suggesting he would continue the tradition after his death.<\/p>\n

I wondered what, if anything, my grandfather remembers. I don\u2019t know why I see him. No one else does. I brought Grammy here once as an experiment. Together we strolled circumnavigating the pond, as my eyes searched the shore, heart sinking. He didn\u2019t show. Sensing my disappointment, Grammy squeezed my forearm. I haven\u2019t brought anyone else.<\/p>\n

Now, from under the shade of a great pine, I watch Grandpa rummaging through his tackle box, sifting its contents with just his fingertips. Taking careful steps I approach, my hand clenched tight, encasing an old pocketknife.<\/p>\n

Sometimes he knows who I am. Mostly, he thinks I\u2019m a stranger.<\/p>\n

Others see him, not people who knew him, but joggers, dog walkers, and occasional anglers. They exchange nods, proof of awareness.<\/p>\n

Today, I have a plan. My grandfather\u2019s stare holds steadfast on the red and white bobber floating on the water below even as I crouch beside him. I lay a hand on his shoulder; it is solid and warm. At last, he looks at me and I reveal the pocketknife. The one he\u2019d carried since Korea, the knife I\u2019ve kept on me since his funeral. \u201cYou dropped this.\u201d<\/p>\n

The toothpick stills and there\u2019s a glint in his eye. He shakes his head. \u201cHush now. You\u2019ll scare the fish away.\u201d<\/p>\n

I sit beside him on the damp wooden planks. Dragonflies skim the water like thrown stones scattering the falling sunbeams. When I glance down at my legs I see that his are gone. I am alone on the dock. Next to me rests a solitary toothpick. A sigh of a laugh escapes me and I return my gaze to the pond.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

L.L. MADRID<\/strong> lives in Tucson where she can smell the rain before it falls. She resides with her four-year-old daughter, an antisocial cat, and on occasion, a scorpion or two. Her work can be found lurking in various corners of the internet and at llmadrid.weebly.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

L. L. Madrid   Every Sunday my grandfather fishes at Ripple Pond. It\u2019s an old habit, one anchored in boyhood. His mother allowed him to forgo church for fishing, as he was more contemplative by the water\u2019s edge. Today he\u2019s … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"parent":7332,"menu_order":1,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-7333","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/P15duy-1Uh","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7333","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7333"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7333\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7355,"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7333\/revisions\/7355"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7332"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jerseydevilpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7333"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}