It would be an understatement to say that I am not a particularly outdoorsy person. Yes, I like to garden, but that seems to me more like an inside activity, just taken outside. To me, the garden is just like another room. However, through the miracle of parenthood, I often have the opportunity to broaden my horizons.
Fishing isn’t something that I ever imagined I’d like all that much. The last time I went fishing was well over 20 years ago and it wasn’t a success. It was probably the first time I ever really wanted to go fishing. My mother, an avid “fisherperson”, liked to spend Saturdays and Sundays along the river and I would take a book along to try to pass the time. I think once or twice it was Anna Karenina, which shows you just how boring I thought fishing was when I was 14 or so. If a three pound Tolstoy paperback on a sunny 4th of July was my idea of a refuge, fishing must have been pretty bad.
However, on this particular trip up the McKenzie River, I was ready to cast that line and bring in some fish. I was going to make this happen, and it was going to be great. No sooner had we arrived than my mother caught herself. Her finger spiked with a particularly barbed lour, it looked like fishing was done for the day. I couldn’t believe it. I finally want to fish and this is the prize we catch? (No offense, mom.) A long drive back to town and a visit to the emergency room completed the day. Looking back on it, despite the pain that I am sure my mom endured, it makes a much more memorable day. And isn’t that how it usually is with family events? It’s the disasters and mishaps that we laugh about years later.
One of the most memorable family trips I can remember took place almost ten years ago. It was the last Saturday before Halloween and it could not have been a stormier day. The sky was black, the wind was fierce and the rain was coming down in sheets. Despite the weather, we drove to a farm just outside of Corvallis, my home town and one of my favorite places. As we arrived, the rain let up a bit, but it was still cold and windy. My wife, four of our kids and I left the security of the family van and tramped along the path to the pumpkin patch, really more of a muddy lake by now. Being the only visitors, the farmer let one of my sons drive the tractor with him, perhaps the highlight of his life to that point. As we slipped and slid around the patch, we searched for the perfect pumpkin. Jack, the most intrepid of my children, found his - halfway across the farm and twice his size. I’ll never forget the sight of that boy trying to push that enormous jack-o-lantern through the mud, sliding and falling along the way. That’s Jack to a tee – he will do whatever it takes to accomplish what he puts his mind to, no matter how messy the process may be. It is no exaggeration to say that we were absolutely covered in mud by the time it was all over. Everyone except my wife and daughter – two people somehow able to maintain their dignity in the most trying of circumstances - had to make the 45 mile drive home pantless and shoeless (how would you explain that to a State Trooper?). This, however, lives in my mind as one of the best outings ever.
Families are imperfect, to say the least. We all try our best to live up to the ideal, but if we try too hard, we might miss some of the best moments. Years from now, we’ll still be talking and laughing about that fishing trip and our pumpkin hunt. And I hope we’ll have many more of these times together.
And, by the way, I’ve finally been won over by fishing – the original topic of this piece. Thanks to a very persuasive son, the redhead with the electric smile - I was able to spend a perfect morning with my hook in the water… and in the trees, and the grass and, almost, my finger. It’s not just the mishaps I’m thankful for, but also the opportunity to find new interests, and new ways to connect with my kids.
You know, life really is a great gift.
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Thursday, March 26, 2009
They say that clothes make the man, or woman, but I don’t think this is strictly the case. They can, however, be a window into the kind of person one might be dealing with.
My job allows me to see a good cross-section of people of a certain age. If you’re over 65, you are the people I want to talk to. Insurance for the elderly is not a terribly lucrative line of work, but it’s steady. Once you turn 65, you generally don’t want to be without it, and fear of financial ruin is a marvelous motivator for people to invest in a health plan.
We often hear of the “love-ins” of the Sixties, but I can personally attest to the fact that it occurred about 20 years earlier. For all of the “loving” the flower-children did, they simply don’t have the same kind of evidence of their amorousness to back up their claims. Ozzie and Harriet might have slept in separate beds, but they, and their generational counterparts, are the parents of a baby boom the likes of which were never seen before, and won’t be seen again. And the fruits of their, uh, labor show up at my informational meetings every day.
What is amazing is the way some of these people look. I think I have seen it all, or at least most of it. Perhaps most frightening was the woman with long, flowing, curly hair wearing a mini-skirt and tank top that came to a meeting at a pancake house several years ago. From afar, she looked like your standard floozy. But, up close you could see that her plastic surgeon may have lifted things a little too far and a little too often. Her inability to blink was troubling, especially when she fixed you with a gaze that was somewhat alarming, almost motionless and creepily hungry. Her husband seemed proud of his “youthful” wife, and she in turn seemed to fawn over him and his alarmingly long comb over. If these are the golden years, I’m putting my money into silver.
Looks are not everything, and it’s a good thing. One of the more disturbing features of the greatest generation is their choice of footwear. It appears that at about age 65, or retirement, whichever is first, it becomes necessary to purchase several pairs of really, really ugly shoes. Next time you are in a room full of senior citizens, take a look down. Chances are you will see a sea of shoes, ranging in whiteness from dark ivory to a shocking Seinfeld-sneaker white. Their only redeeming factor must be comfort, or perhaps a very low price at Costco. And judging by the number of couples who have these perfectly matching pairs of shoes, they must also be part of a buy one get one free deal. .
Don’t misunderstand me, these are good people. People who’ve been tried by wars and depressions. They are the salt of the earth. But why is it that a group of people who lived through some of the most stylish periods of our history have thrown it all away for the comfort and savings of Walmart. Women who once emulated Grace Kelly and Jackie Kennedy now seem to think that silky track suits in bold color combinations of olive green, navy blue and boring beige are de rigeur. The men are, not surprisingly, no better. Note to the obviously wealthy gentlemen taking lunch at his local Red Robin – that velour shirt wasn’t even in style when it was new, and that twenty-something waitress is not interested.
As I approach my later years, and there’s a long time before I actually hit them, I want to be mindful of my appearance. I have hopes that this loss of style can be avoided, although my wife and daughter assure me that, in my case, there’s not all the much style to lose.
My job allows me to see a good cross-section of people of a certain age. If you’re over 65, you are the people I want to talk to. Insurance for the elderly is not a terribly lucrative line of work, but it’s steady. Once you turn 65, you generally don’t want to be without it, and fear of financial ruin is a marvelous motivator for people to invest in a health plan.
We often hear of the “love-ins” of the Sixties, but I can personally attest to the fact that it occurred about 20 years earlier. For all of the “loving” the flower-children did, they simply don’t have the same kind of evidence of their amorousness to back up their claims. Ozzie and Harriet might have slept in separate beds, but they, and their generational counterparts, are the parents of a baby boom the likes of which were never seen before, and won’t be seen again. And the fruits of their, uh, labor show up at my informational meetings every day.
What is amazing is the way some of these people look. I think I have seen it all, or at least most of it. Perhaps most frightening was the woman with long, flowing, curly hair wearing a mini-skirt and tank top that came to a meeting at a pancake house several years ago. From afar, she looked like your standard floozy. But, up close you could see that her plastic surgeon may have lifted things a little too far and a little too often. Her inability to blink was troubling, especially when she fixed you with a gaze that was somewhat alarming, almost motionless and creepily hungry. Her husband seemed proud of his “youthful” wife, and she in turn seemed to fawn over him and his alarmingly long comb over. If these are the golden years, I’m putting my money into silver.
Looks are not everything, and it’s a good thing. One of the more disturbing features of the greatest generation is their choice of footwear. It appears that at about age 65, or retirement, whichever is first, it becomes necessary to purchase several pairs of really, really ugly shoes. Next time you are in a room full of senior citizens, take a look down. Chances are you will see a sea of shoes, ranging in whiteness from dark ivory to a shocking Seinfeld-sneaker white. Their only redeeming factor must be comfort, or perhaps a very low price at Costco. And judging by the number of couples who have these perfectly matching pairs of shoes, they must also be part of a buy one get one free deal. .
Don’t misunderstand me, these are good people. People who’ve been tried by wars and depressions. They are the salt of the earth. But why is it that a group of people who lived through some of the most stylish periods of our history have thrown it all away for the comfort and savings of Walmart. Women who once emulated Grace Kelly and Jackie Kennedy now seem to think that silky track suits in bold color combinations of olive green, navy blue and boring beige are de rigeur. The men are, not surprisingly, no better. Note to the obviously wealthy gentlemen taking lunch at his local Red Robin – that velour shirt wasn’t even in style when it was new, and that twenty-something waitress is not interested.
As I approach my later years, and there’s a long time before I actually hit them, I want to be mindful of my appearance. I have hopes that this loss of style can be avoided, although my wife and daughter assure me that, in my case, there’s not all the much style to lose.
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