June 8: A story about Alex and early fish

Really, I'm pounding away on the computer, testing for statistically significant differences and wondering what has changed since 2009. But then I stepped outside for a minute and felt the onshore wind - my favorite is the one that comes from the southwest. My mom always said that was the fish wind. I never understood how the wind (above the water) influences where the fish swim (inside the water), but I definitely think it does.

I used to believe that the fish run in 5 year cycles. Well, 5 years ago was 2008, our biggest year ever with 230,000 lbs. Yep, big. But the year before that, the fish were early. A wonderful crew member from the UW Fisheries department was up with Alex and me getting set up about a week before everyone else. Just the three of us to get it all set up. He was an eager fisherman, so we put some nets out early and pretty much just picked them on the ebb. The 21st of June was stormy. It was so stormy and Matt was so new that he didn't want to get in the little dingy with me to paddle through the storm out to the skiff. So Alex, just 15, went with me. Matt walked us out as far as he could to try to get us through the giant surf break but we couldn't paddle fast enough, and the dingy filled with water (it's plastic with flotation, so it doesn't go to the bottom) and we were pushed back onshore. We emptied the dingy and tried it again. It was a slightly insane thing to attempt - well, maybe a little more than slightly. Locals were stopping to take pictures. But I have confidence in that dingy. It is great for weather like that because it is soft sided, so it doesn't capsize - it just absorbs the blow from the waves. However, if the water pours in from the top, well, we're sunk and we get pushed back in.

After about the third time of trying and failing, we started to count the waves and watch the pattern. After a half dozen big breakers, there's usually a lull of a few waves. If we can rush out during that lull and then paddle like mad, we can make it. And we did. Completely exhausted by the time we got to the boat. I asked Alex to start pulling anchor while I got the outboard started... and he didn't want to. He felt like we'd done enough. "OK, so we proved that we're bad-asses - now can we just wait for the tide to go out?" But no, we couldn't. We had planned to go back in for Matt on the running line, but it was just too rough, so we decided to handle the nets ourselves - very hard for just two people in any weather, and especially in weather that rough. And we really had to do it because by then we realized that we had fish and if we let them go dry on the flats... another calamity. We weren't yet prepared to get them off the flats.

So Alex, never short on courage, pulled anchor and we got out to the nets to find them pretty full of fish. With the tide falling, we only had time to roundhaul the nets - that means detach them from one buoy and pull ourselves along (against the wind and the tide), piling the nets and fish and tundra and old boots into the boat... and then going to get the next one and running into shore before the water went out from under us. It was a huge undertaking and we did it - ending up with 3900 lbs for the tide when we usually expect less than 300 lbs on that date.

Alex turned into a fine setnetter by the time he was 16. He had developed the needed grit and determination, and with those qualities, he learned that he could accomplish remarkable feats. I believe he used them and the memories of the experiences that helped him find them, to go on to accomplish other remarkable feats and overcome enormous obstacles. He didn't come back fishing with us, but he took fishing with him into the rest of his life. For all of us, fishing changes how we see ourselves and what we believe is possible. For everyone, who we are is the interaction of our being with our experiences. In that sense, we never lose anything because if we experienced it, it is part of us. Alex will be with me, the next rough tide or when we pull off something impossible.