Getting back on the perch

The kids these days have a word for it: "meh." One dictionary definition of this rather unattractive sounding modern word proposes that "Meh is an interjection used as an expression of indifference or boredom. It is often regarded as a verbal equivalent of a shrug of the shoulders." It's a word much less associated with relaxed nonchalance and far more suggestive of the descent into lethargy. The early days of the New Year were ones in which I was visited by an overwhelming feeling of "meh." Work was busy but after the Christmas break (and an outbreak of Covid in the family, which led to a few days of us largely living in separate parts of the same house) I was struggling to find my usual enthusiasm for anything, and with the Diocesan offices once again closed in response to the latest national outbreak of the now too familiar plague, I was beginning to feel the cumulative effects of two years of living a more solitary life than is my norm. The extrovert side of my personality was suffering as a result of the frustrations of so much of what would form my normal human contact now being mediated through the unsatisfactory medium of screen time on Zoom. Even more worrying, was that I was struggling to summon the energy to engage in the activities that I usually find life-giving and energising. Several times I contemplated fishing but each time I failed to summon the requisite enthusiasm. Eventually, as the first month of 2022 drew to a close, realising that something had to give, I roused myself from my emotional stupour and contacted Roger, who agreed with my diagnosis that the only cure for my sense of ennui was for me to get off my backside and for us to spend a few hours together chasing perch at the Club Lake.

It was the last day of January when our diaries and work and family commitments gave us the first opportunity to fish together, providing a welcome window of a few hours from lunchtime into the afternoon for angling activity. We set up in adjacent swims, both employing a simple float and red maggot approach and predictably both choosing to indulge our preference for utilising vintage tackle and were joined by our friend David who, now retired, fishes at least once a week every week, much to the envy of Roger and I. 

In the event, from a fishing perspective the afternoon proved to be a struggle. David started off on prawns, while Roger and I opted for a float fished red maggot approach. The wind swirled and howled, the air was cold and the fish uncompliant. In time, David also switched to maggots and we all picked up roach, tiny perch and the odd rogue carp, but the larger perch we sought remained elusive, until inside the last hour I connected with a fish whose fight was instantly recognisable as that of a decently sized perch. My striped adversary gave a commendable account of itself before surrendering to the net and turned out to be a venerable old warrior complete with a hole in it's spikey dorsal which registered a weight of 2 pounds and 3 ounces, the only notable fish to fall to any of us on what had been an engrossing but exacting afternoon's piscatorial activity.

Despite the challenging nature of the fishing it had been a good afternoon beside the lake with Roger and David, the enjoyment not diminished by the cold or the perch's general unwillingness to please, and yet another reminder of how fine the line sometimes is between success and failure- even on the hardest of days it only requires one fish to momentarily drop its guard to turn defeat into a future treasured memory. The triumvirate of place, people, and memory has always been an intrinsic part of how I make sense of my own story, and the Club Lake is rapidly joining other lakes from my angling history as a place in which I feel comfortably rooted and where memories are being made that will give birth to the stories of tomorrow, and the best of those stories will include within them the company of friends. My tackle packed away, I looked around the lake for one last time and recalled that the earliest Christians contended that God had given us two books of revelation: the book of Scripture, and the book of creation. They weren't wrong. There is much unnecessary beauty in the natural world, and for it I am grateful. The secret is to make time to pay attention to it, to listen to what is says and to respond with thankfulness. It doesn't take much to make me happy- sometimes it's as simple as just one fish.