Well, Debbie earned the title of Badass Angler this weekend, while I, on the other hand, earned only the lowly nickname Smells like Cow Patty.
We went down to Letohatchee Friday night after attending my cousin Henry Haskell’s wedding. The wedding went off without (or rather, with) a hitch, except that afterwards I walked up to Henry and accidentally called him Sam as I was congratulating him. My own cousin, and I call him by his brother’s name. Sheesh. I was immediately embarrassed of course, but my embarassment subsided once he corrected me and then... seemed... to... have... well, forgotten my name as well. I don’t see Henry a lot so it's not very surprising, plus the man had just gotten married, for chrissakes. He’s too worried about his future to be bothered with petty details from the past.
Anyway, so we forewent the reception in favor of heading out to the country side, which we did under a 3/4 moon and a clear, cloudless night sky. We got to the farm around 11:00 and drove down the dirt road past dozens of cows staring at us, not sure whether they should run away, attack us or stand there and stare dumbly into our lights. Luckily, they chose the latter. As I got out of the car to open up the gate I could hear cows bellowing in chorus out across the fields. I think they were all mating.
Anyway, the cows kept up their amorous trumpeting throughout the evening while we cooked up dinner and built a roaring fire in the fireplace. Being a clear night, it was cold, the stars like cold pinpoints of in the dark waters of the sky. The moon lit the ground like blue sunshine, bright enough to read by. A wonderful night.
So we got up the next morning and cooked breakfast, cleaned house, and loaded up the four-wheeler to do some fishing. We drove around the other side of the pond so we could set up shop on the dam, at which point the pond is very deep and tends to house large fish. Willows used to grow there, and the catfish would pool in the cool water beneath their branches. The beavers took those trees away years ago, though. The fish are still there, just deeper.
We went through probably eight cattle gates and finally got to the fishing spot, and Debbie started tossing out her “green worm with sparklies” while I went and chatted with my cousin-in-law, who was fishing on the dock. As I came back, Debbie started hollering that she’d caught one, and I smiled. I figured she’d caught a nice bass, maybe even a small catfish. But what came out of the water wiped my smug smirk from my face — it was HUGE, the biggest bass I’ve seen come out of that place in years.
She wrestled in up to shore and we couldn’t believe it. Though we thought it a ten-pounder at first ( I told Mark C. is was 12), it turned out to be almost 7 pounds, and 21 inches long. Not a mounter, but still a fine fish. Big Bertha finally met her match, indeed.
By the time we took it back and put it in the freezer, got the four-wheeler fixed and made it back out to the pond, the sun was sinking low in the large blue-into-orange sky. We only caught a few more small bass before day ended. And as we walked on up to the house in the dusk, our clothes and shoes becrapped, our hands ripe with bass slime, we laughed and titles were bestowed.
Debbie is officially a badass fisherwoman. Let all sing her praises.