Ian's Fish

I tried a long time ago to write this story into a picture book as a gift
for the boy who stars in it.  It seems it has emerged instead as an essay.
It's long for a blog, but I think some of you will enjoy it anyway.

Ian and the Blue Gill

        Three women, ranging in age from senior to ancient, are settled in
half circle at the end of the dock.  The chairs have been dragged down to
the pond from the main house, metal lawn chairs with woven seats in white
and green, and there are only those three, so Ian and I sit on the wooden
slats of the dock.  A little while ago, there were some bigger boys, young
teenagers in baggy shorts and skinny chests, daring each other to swim in
the murky water, but they're gone now, leaving this little circle.

         The old women wear cotton skirts and sensible shoes and soft cotton
hats to protect their good complexions. Gnarled fingers fix bait, and
fishing lines trail lazily in the water of the small pond.  The air is thick
and still, so hot I find it hard to breathe, and my son's pale cheeks are
flushed.  We are Colorado natives, and this is the countryside of the border
between Missouri and Illinois and I'd rather be almost anywhere else besides
this farmland with three old woman fishing.

         I hate fishing. I hate humidity.  I hate the heat.  I had been
excited about the family gathering with my husband's family, but the reality
is daunting.  It's hard to understand some of their deep south accents, and
I don't understand references to times and people I don't know. And maybe
they're not patronizing me, the much-younger, blond wife of an older
African-American man, but all the usual in-law negotiations of time and
fitting in make it feel like they might be.  I'm shy, which makes it worse.
I'm not even thirty and bookish and wilting in this heat they all take for
granted and I don't even know where I fit in the world I came from, much
less this one.

          But here we are.  My younger boy,  never still, running like a
banshee with his wild hair and wilder grin around the orchard with his
cousins, and he is a Williams, through and through, the spitting image of
his grandmother, sitting here on the dock in the dappled shade of
midafternoon.  Ian and I share a more pensive nature, and we have escaped to
the dock so Ian can fish with his grandmother, Lurelean, who is one of the
kindest humans I have ever known and will influence my life more than I can
even begin to imagine that day, on the dock.

         Even then, in all my bristling insecurity, I know for sure that my
mother-in-law loves me, and my boys.  She sees through to the truth of
things-this marriage, for all the differences in age and culture, is a
genuine love match, and she is overjoyed that her son, who wandered and
wandered, is settled at last, a kind father, a good husband.

         It gives me comfort to sit with Lurelean on the dock. Still, I'm
feeling slightly ill in the oppressive, inescapable heat. I can't return to
the house because, sitting with the old woman is one small white boy with an
earnest expression and his own fishing line, baited for him by his
grandmother, who is sitting with one of her sisters, and their mother,
Grandma Mag, past ninety, and wearing glasses so thick her eyes look
cartoony.  Grandma Mag, it must be said, has no patience left in her for
small children-she's raised or helped raise too many of them, and she's not
interested in caretaking any more.  Fishing is her passion, and she holds no
truck with conversation.  Ian promises to be quiet, and she grudgingly lets
him stay.

          Honestly, I have no idea where he got the idea that he wanted to
fish in the first place. I can't even imagine that he's ever heard anyone
talking about it.  We live in the city and none of my family have ever
fished.  We rarely go to the mountains or even to the reservoir, where he
might have seen others fishing.

         But there he sits with the old women, his fishing line in the
water.  He's five.  Surprisingly pretty, with a plump mouth and vivid,
changeable eyes and tumbles of blond hair which tends to be too long because
I'm forgetful and don't get it cut as often as I should.  He's so earnest,
sitting there, waiting for a fish.  The women comment on his stillness, both
surprised and proud, but I could tell them his tenaciousness is already
legendary.  His hands, which will one day be long and graceful and very
beautiful, are still a little plump. He focuses.  The old women murmur to
one another now and then.  They've caught some blue gills, which are kept
alive in a cooler.

          I sit near the back of the dock, drinking a soda, trying to stay
out of the sun, though it doesn't really matter.  In Colorado, just stepping
into the shade will drop the temperature twenty degrees.  Not so here, and I
have discovered it doesn't even get cool at night.  First thing in the
morning, it's still humid and still and thick.  Honestly, I'm miserable.
Trying to be brave and cheerful in such wretched weather-that doesn't seem
to be bothering anybody else, even though we will later hear it was 106
degrees with humidity in the 90s-and all I really want to do is dive into
the water where my tears will be hidden.  And yet, even that is not a
possibility.  I've seen snapping turtles in the water, the evil triangular
head of a snake glide by, silent and threatening.

        Suddenly, the thick dull silence is punctured by splashes.
Exclamations. Ian has hooked a fish! His grandmother leaps to her feet to
help him reel it in, and there it is, thrashing and splashing against the
line, a slippery, glistening blue gill.  It shines in the sun, and they land
it together, and put it in its own cooler of water. It stares wildly up at
us, and Ian squats down to admire it, beaming at the praise of the old
women.  Even the ancient one warms the slightest bit.

         And that's that. He declines the offer of another baited hook. He
isn't interested in fishing anymore, though he sits quietly and happily with
his grandmother.  His dad comes down to the dock and Ian shows off his
catch, and everyone fusses once again.

         As the day wanes, the children are cranky, and it's time to drive
back to St. Louis. Ian is anxious about his fish.  "How will we get him
home?" he asks.  "What will we feed him?"

        One of the men now on the dock laughs heartily. "Son, you'll eat
him, not the other way around."

       "What?" His eyes fill with tears.  "I don't want to eat him!"

       Everyone chuckles this away at first, thinking he's just encountering
the reality of eating what you've killed.  They think he'll change his mind
once he takes a bit of that sweet flesh.

       But his grandmother is looking at him in her careful way.  She puts
her hand on his back. "What do you want to do with him, baby?"

       Ian says, "I want to take him home."

       It dawns on me, finally, where he got the idea of fishing.  Every
year at the local State Fair, there is a display by the Fish and Wildlife
Organization, a giant freshwater aquarium, filled with big river trout
swimming in splendor for all to see.  Ian loves it, the coppery, flashing
fish, their long feathery tails.

         There in the cooler is a shimmery blue fish with ruffling fins.
"You wanted a pet," I say. "You thought you would get to keep him?"

         Ian, blinking hard, nods.

         Arranged around us are the old women, who love to catch fish and
eat them.  And men who've fed their families on the fish they caught, the
animals they killed.  They are not happy with boys who cry, and for good
reason.  In their old world, it served them to make men tough and stoic.

          But there is Lurelean, who gently shakes her head at the old man.
"He's as tender-hearted as his daddy," she says, and that daddy steps up.

         "We can't take him home, son," he says. "But we can let him go."

          Someone protests. "That's a good supper there!"

         "Leave the boy alone," Lurelean says, enfolding her gnarled hand
around the boy's.  His daddy carries the cooler, and together, the three of
them tip the fish into the water, where it dives into the depths and swims
away, traumatized but free to live another day.

          Finally, we are driving back to St. Louis in the twilight.  The
children are exhausted, and I sit in the back seat with them, one on either
side.  Lurelea sat in the front seat with her own boy, who used to take two
buses on a Saturday afternoon to go to shop for her hearing aid battery.  A
boy maybe a bit too sensitive for his environment who grew up and became a
man who could help a boy tip a living fish back in the water.  They're
talking quietly, peacefully, and I am enfolded in the tenderness and
coolness.

          We're passing little towns and bushes and wide fields of grass.
Where, suddenly I see stars.  In the grass. "Stop the car!" I cry "What is
that?

          My husband pulls over. "What is it?"

          "Are those fireflies?"

          Lurelean laughs gently.  "Isn't that a wonder. Child, you've never
seen fireflies?

          The boys and I stare open mouthed, shaking our heads.  They don't
live in Colorado.   In astonished wonder, we stand at the edge of the road,
watching light dance in the twilight, humidity enveloping us like arms, the
quiet of evening like acceptance, the sparks of belonging dancing in the
grass.

Comments

[Tapsi]

Oh, I was feeling just a tiny bit blue...and then I read something, anything, you've written and I fall a little in love. Thank you.

[AnneGracie]

Beautiful story. I cried.
Thank you.

[Denise]

Great story and I love the fireflies part. My DH and I grew up with fireflies and I miss them in Colorado. Our boys fell in love with them the first time we took a family vacation back East. Free entertainment...chasing and catching firelfies to put in a jar.

[caro]

I loved this.

He is exactly the same tender hearted boy turned man at 24. Thank you for him.

[Barbara]

Pretty sure he was just born that way, Caro. He took on a couple of bullies over a dog once, too. Brave and foolhardy.

Thanks to all of you for sharing with me.

[Barbara]

PS Tapsi, can't think of a higher compliment than that. Thanks.