The Schernoff Discoveries by Gary Paulsen

Author:Gary Paulsen
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780307804181
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2011-08-02T21:00:00+00:00

6. On Angling

A fish doesn’t know anything, ever, at all, about anything. Which is why fish are so hard to catch.

—HAROLD ON FISHING WITH WORMS

The truth is I never saw Harold really fail at anything except fishing. All the other times he got close to failure, came around the edge of it, bumped right up into it, but he always came out ahead in some way.

Except when it came to fishing.

It all started one summer night when we were setting pins. Ernie was going to close the bowling alley over the weekend—his slowest time—and sand and varnish the alleys.

“A whole weekend,” I said as we left the bowling alley. I had almost four dollars saved and I thought of movies—there was a horror film showing on Saturday night—or maybe buying a stick model of a B-17 bomber that I wanted to make or just spending the whole time at the swimming beach down on Crooked River trying to work up the courage to dive off the high board when none of the girls was looking. Or be really brave and do it when they were looking. If they looked. Ever.

“I want,” Harold said slowly, “to go fishing.”

For a moment it didn’t register. “We could go to a movie.…”

“No. I wish to go fishing.”

“You mean fishing … like outside? You?”

“Wherever the fish are. That is where I want to go fishing. You are good at this, aren’t you?”

“But Harold, you don’t—”

“I don’t what?”

That stopped me. I was going to say that he didn’t do things outside. We had tried skiing and nearly died and as far as I knew he spent the rest of his time indoors working on his ham radio equipment or reading technical bulletins. I couldn’t even get him to go swimming in the town swimming area down on Crooked River. He was no hunter, and the only times we bicycled anywhere together were just to get from one building to another. He got sunburned walking across the yard—and that was on a cloudy day.

“I don’t what?” he repeated.

“You don’t fish.”

“Exactly why I want to go fishing. To learn. It’s the manly thing to do and I want to be more manly.”

“Manly?”

“Exactly. You will teach me. The way you taught me the art of hunting.”

I winced, remembering. He had wanted to hunt. I used a .22 single-shot and let him try the .410 shotgun. We just went into the brush, a small stand where I had seen grouse earlier. Not over ten acres of trees and willows. Harold got lost four times, shot two stumps, a clump of newspaper, and just missed the end of his foot. He finally bagged a grouse so, in his eyes, he was successful. I can still hear his shot whistling over my head.

“But you don’t have any gear, anything …”

“So what do we need—a hook, some string? How hard can it be? People do it all the time.”

“Harold, fishing is … is more …” I thought suddenly of early morning light, casting

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