Old Man and the Sea
So I'm out fishing on the flats last Sunday. Mommy's home watching the booglet and Bobalouie and I squeeze in a rare expedition. I'm casting with my favorite "lucky" top water lure--slayer of many a redfish (Sciaenops ocellatus) and speckled trout (Cynoscion nebulosus). The sun is bright, the sky is sharp blue, and the north wind that brought a chop to the bay when we took off has settled into a pleasant Zephyr, calming the water around us in this little cove. Fishing, feeling the tug on the other end of your line, the primal hunter gatherer fix.

I cast out and slowly drag the lure back, watching it's ripple over the clear water. Then comes the fin. Leisurely he's following my lure, a four foot black tip shark (Charcharchinus limbatus). Bobalouie and I watch him until he's right up near the boat. The shark makes a move toward my lure, a slight tilting of his head. I snatch the lure out of the water--he would have made short work of my ten pound test line, not to mention my lucky lure.

Bobalouie and I exchange glances like "did you just see that shark cruising through these waters? These waters we routinely jump into and swim when it gets too hot?" We laughed for ten minutes thinking about actually trying to wrestle with that fish, me saying it would have been an "Old Man and the Sea" moment, and Bobalouie noting we could just as well wait outside the boat while he flopped around in it rather than jump and dodge a pissed off shark taken from his element. Oh man we laughed!

Later that night, Mommy, Daddy, my daughter and Chester went back down to the water, out to the gazebo where a man and his two young sons were packing up after an afternoon of fishing. They had caught a nice redfish. My daughter looked at it and said "redfish." I hadn't had such luck--a fact which my wife readily pointed out for me--but just seeing the shark made the trip worth it.

And laughing with Bobalouie.