Take a moment and picture your version of a perfect day of fishing. It probably involves beautiful scenery, a perfect day, and an image of yourself fighting with a big fish. To be completely honest, I don't know how many...if any...fish were caught on this particular warm summer evening. My wife Valerie, Daren, and I were fishing in a flat bottomed boat in an old isolated gravel pit pond. This was a peaceful place away from everything, and it contained an abundance of bass along with the occasional big catfish.
We fished for a couple hours casting for bass while each of us had a catfish rig hanging peacefully off the side of the boat. To display an accurate picture of how "professional" we must have looked, we always kept our trusty .22 rifle in the boat to shoot the bigger fish as soon as they surfaced. This kept them from getting free or snapping the line during the fight to get them completely in the boat. Daren was barefoot of course, and wore his usual frayed, scissor shortened Liberty brand overalls. His paper sack of "flea market wonder" fishing lures was present. Valerie was a beautiful sun tanned country girl with sunglasses and shorts. Insert mental image here: Val-- "country music video girl casting her line" in slow motion. As for me, I am telling the story, so I was naturally the the smartest one in the boat. We'll leave it at that.
As the evening sun sank into the horizon, we all knew that we had time for only a few more casts before we had to pack it up. Daren was switching lures every other cast at this point trying to surprise any wise old fish with something weird. While rustling through his paper sack, he noticed that he had a toy rubber snake inside. As he gestured and showed it to me, we engaged in a silent conversation with our eyes and hands while Val gazed at the sunset over her fishing pole....
Daren baited his catfish rig with that rubber snake. He let it sink to the bottom and must have waited for fifteen more minutes for "dusky dark" to arrive. Then suddenly, he sprang up from his seat, shaking the boat, and shouted "Got a big one!" He really played up a fight by making his rod dip into the water and dart from this direction and that. The whole pond had erupted with excitement! We were all whooping and shrieking with anticipation! As he reeled the line in closer, he caught a glimpse of the snake and knew it was close enough. "Grab the line Valerie!" he barked as it seemed to pull his rod toward her side of the boat. Excited, she leaned way over the boat's side and reached for his line. At that exact moment, Daren jerked the snake up out of the water and began shaking it right in front of her. "Snake!" she screamed as she scramble backward. I don't think at this point she would still appear like the "romantic country music video girl" from earlier. In fact, I'd say that my wife actually levitated above that boat for an instant while still managing to kick over everything within eight feet of her short legs! In an instant, Daren had to drop his fishing pole, and literally football tackle her to keep her from jumping overboard. During the commotion, he had to bear hug her for a bit longer to keep her in the boat! Me? I was already slumped over from oxygen deprivation from laughing so hard.
Her eyes were bigger than silver dollars, and after she realized that it was a joke, came her barrage of swats and threats...like "I am gonna keeel y'all!", and "you just wait!"...."it goes both ways!"...etc.... Of course she was shouting all these threats between long flurries of laughter. I will never forget the simultaneous look of terror and surprise on her face! The sound of Daren's raspy laugh mixed in with our own will be ingrained in my memory forever. I am sure that the laughter continued long after we left as the bull frogs and the mud turtles compared their own accounts of the event.
God puts us all here for a reason. If we seek after Him and live according to His will and purpose for our lives, random funny moments like these can come about so easily. Casting our cares on Him enables us to live with a "carefree attitude" that makes life less stressful and more memorable! Don't worry about tomorrow, just have some fun today and make some good memories.
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