I was thirteen that summer. I had a pair of jean culotte overalls, and I thought I was a little female Huckley Berry Fin. They made my barefoot, Tomboy spirit so happy. Heck, I’d like to have a pair for yard work again, today.
That June Daddy said he would take me fishing all day on the River.
We loaded up his little Nissan truck. It was a stick shift and smelled like a damp basement, but I always loved the smell. It wasn’t a rotten smell, it was an age-ed smell. Like old books and wet moss. He hitched the boat trailer, drove up the steep circle drive; we picked up some supplies at Waltons and headed down the road. Whenever we hit up the store I would always get some cheese Pringles, an IBC root beer, (glass bottle of course) and a corn dog if they had them hot. Dad usually got a Pepsi, potted meat and Vienna sausages. (It should have been for stink bait, but he actually LIKED eating them, a link to his childhood, I guess). Ugg…still can’t stand the smell of potted meat-rotten cat food, ha.
The Mississippi River was about 5 miles away. We went over the levee and there she was, flowing with all her might. We drove down the dirt and gravel input ramp, Dad backed his boat in, loaded it, and I sat in the truck and just watched. It was amazing all the work he would do to go fishing. The boat and motor always had some issues, but Dad was the fixer of all, and before long she was purring again.
Finally it was time to get her in the water. My feet got a little wet, but we were well on our way. We drove for a while with the big motor and then we cast anchor near a sandbar. When he was driving the boat, my eyelids got heavy. He said, “Are you here to sleep or fish?”
I think I said both, but he didn’t chastise me, just told me to take my rest. I was his little girl, and I knew he would let me sleep, eat, fish, or do anything I wanted, really. You could see the love in his eye even when he would correct me. I was his little girl, and he took the whole day to share HIS special world with me.
In the afternoon we anchored into a sandbar. He said I could get out and swim a little. That was the first time he had ever said that. Fishing was serious business, and we weren’t allowed to “scare away the fish” by splashing in the water, but today was different. Today was a full day on the River, and that included more than just fishing. I was a little nervous about snakes, but he said there weren’t near as many in the River as there were in the Lake, so I reluctantly got in the water. The next thing I know I was having the best time. I laid in the sun to dry, and got the strangest tan lines with my overhauls. An ice cold root beer in a glass bottle never tastes as good as when you’re hot on the water. Mom had made us some bologna and cheese sandwiches, and our picnic lunch was perfect.
After that it was time to catch some catfish.
They are the ugliest fresh water fish (besides the Alligator Gar), but they are so fun to catch. Once you get them in the boat the battle is still not over, you have to get the deep set hook out past their tiny little teeth and hold them just right so the fin doesn’t spear you.
Whenever I think of fishing with my dad, this is the day that I remember. There were many other times, most of them on a lake or a watershed, some included hissing water moccasins or hooking minnows behind the eye so you didn’t lose them on the cast, but this time is the most special memory I have of my Dad as a child. His goal that day wasn’t to catch a catfish; it was for me to have a good time, for us to be together, and let the sounds and thoughts of nature fill our spirits.
Nature-the woods, the wild outdoors, the lake; it was Dad’s cathedral, where he would go to clear his head, to meditate, yes, to fish, but really to make peace with God.
I think he was a bit like David-the warrior King from humble beginnings. I’m sure he would go back out to sheep fields and meditate at times. The David who was the giant slayer was also one who loved deeply and felt life so tenderly. His spirit was kind. He was a poet and lyricist, a man after God’s own heart.
Dad was that way. A warrior at times-especially in living life with a debilitating disease. He was fighting a critical illness from the time I was in kindergarten until he died when I was 26. But this man who was hard and tough and could not be held down, when he got up to sing, he would without measure open up his heart and minister in a quiet and tender way. He would share his soul through tears. He would tell of the tragedies that followed his life: being homeless and hitch hiking to Chicago, even all the way to California, being thrown into jail as a young adult, deep poverty as a child, a dad who was a drunk, who eventually died in a car accident as a drunk driver, a mother who was burned up in a house fire, a stillborn daughter buried in a pauper’s cemetery, a baby daughter with a heart condition who needed two major heart surgeries, his liver transplant and multiple rejections, his first granddaughter who only lived for a few short hours, losing his baby sister to an overdose…a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.
He never tried to hide his grief. He told it plain and didn’t hide the pain, but behind it, you could see his attitude of worship. It was a sacrifice of praise, an act of Thanksgiving. The song that he and Mom are known for singing is the song “I Just Want to Thank You Lord.”
But I think his attitude of Thanksgiving didn’t just show up one day when he was in church. It was something that grew inside of him when he would go out and be alone, maybe in a field, the woods, the lake, a river. I’ve heard him testify of his talks with the Lord there. I think like David he mused:
“When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man that thou art mindful of him? And the son of man that thou visitest him?” (Psalms 8:3-4).
Nature has always been special to me, too. Dad taught me that. When we went out on the water, few words were spoken. The sky and the water did the talking, we did the listening. Now, when I look at the beautiful handiwork of the Lord, it helps to clear my mind. I live about an hour from the Gulf of Mexico (there sure weren’t any oceans close to Tennessee), and I find that I have a salty soul. The sound of the waves, the sand, the wind blowing-I just inhale deeply and my spirit feels free. I can let go of so many anchors tying me down. I can commune easier with the Lord with so many man made distractions peeled away. Water, fresh fish, barefoot. I’m not a Huckleberry Fin teenaged girl anymore, but I feel rich. This is something I want to teach my own children. This is a memory I hope they will one day share.
Read the rest of my November Thankfulness Stories here.
Carrie Cox’s Corner 
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