Written By - Tammy Schlosser - 05/16/2007
Link to Original Article here

There are times when I wonder if you know the importance fishing has played in my life.  The best memories I have are in all likelihood only a small sample of the wonderful times we have spent on the water.

Perhaps recounting my earliest memories of you bringing home the Westwind in 1967.  The boats gold and white finish gleamed like a chariot sent from heaven.  The deck was a dizzying swirl of black and white paint laid on to cover the rough-finished fiberglass.  The Johnson Seahorse, constructed of odd shaped triangles was emblazoned on the side of the big 85-horse engine.  I was four and it was huge.

Reminiscing about our first fishing trips might make it clear.  Trolling inside Port Everglades for Jack Crevelle and thinking this is big game fishing!  Or making trips clear out to the whistle buoy where Kingfish could be caught by jigging white bucktails with a strip of ballyhoo attached.  Or the time when Spanish Mackerel were schooling thick as flies in the intracoastal in the shadows of Navy ships. These tails are all wonderful but my heart tells me there is more.

How can I explain the pride in being declared "The Bottom Man" whose sole job was to climb under the trailer after a day on the water and clean the bottom of the boat.  Some might think this was simply a way of keeping a little kid out of the way.  But to me it was a responsibility not to be taken lightly.  That bottom was salty and my family needed ME to get it clean.

When I finally learned to tie on a hook, could anyone else know the joy of getting it right. You let us use the rigs though their integrity was somewhat in doubt.  I wonder today if you or I was happier when they held together.  You showed me how to tie that figure 8 knot a hundred times without loosing your patience.  This gets closer to the importance of fishing or at least the importance of a patient Dad.  Without fishing where else would I have learned either?

Would you believe that it was on a boat where I learned to face fear and conquer it?  It was the day the waterspout erupted on the horizon and forever into the recesses of my young mind.  While I was petrified, you got us together, put on the life vests and steered us clear of danger.  It probably seems like nothing today but then it was clear that careful preparation, knowledge and keeping your cool can overcome great obstacles.  Around that time Neal Armstrong was becoming an American hero.  You explained it wasn't the moon shot that deserved the most attention but rather the failed test launch earlier in the space program where the capsule caught fire and Neil had to think quickly, stay calm and eject to save his life. We may not have had a rocket or fire but we had the old Westwind and that waterspout and to me the lessons were the same.

How many children dream of far away lands with strange animals and great monuments?  How many actually get to go there?  For me it was the two weeks each summer we spent in Islamorada.  The animals covered the reefs and crawled on the rocks and waddled in the tidal pools.  The monument was the great Alligator Lighthouse.  From where we stayed the Light was seven miles away but seemed as far as another world.  The water surrounding it quickly dropped to what then seemed an incredible one hundred feet.  Under the light sat a Navy ship scuttled after loosing a battle with Pirates in 1822.  Early on you deemed this too far to go.  The wait only increased the legend in my mind and the mystique grew.  After several years, and no small amount of begging, we did conquer the Light.  The most excitement coming during the night trips when the world was dark and imaginary Pirate ships laid in wait just out of site making the adventure that much greater.  Even today as we pass the Light on the way offshore I always take a second to soak it in and remember.  Without fishing, neither the anticipation, the events nor the memories would have been born.

How can I explain the responsibility learned by fishing?  All of the thought and effort that goes into making the boat safe for a trip offshore.  The time required learning and executing the rigging of baits and tackle.  The judgement exercised by deciding which fish to release and which to keep.  The thrill of catching and killing our first White Marlin from the 17' Aquasport being replaced years later by realizing the importance of releasing precious resources like these.  I don't think many other people would understand.

If I tried to explain how it felt to be without a boat for seven years would the sense of emptiness seem silly?  How could I explain the mixture of pride, nervousness and anticipation that came with buying my first boat when I do not understand it completely myself?  I think you might understand why I wept just a little the first time I ran my own boat past Alligator Light?   

It is important that now I take friends out and teach them the things you taught me, the same way you taught me, while fishing in the same water we were fishing on when I learned?  Does it matter to anyone else that I take friends and family out in all kinds of weather, confident that I can make it back because I learned how to do it from "Neal Armstrong" himself?   

It may only be fishing but it is where I spend the best of times with best friends.  It is were you taught me everything I needed to know to get this far and where I will learn everything I need to know to carry on from here.  It is where I felt your love for the first time and remember my first accomplishments.  It is how our family still spends precious time together.  It is where you taught me responsibility and discipline and I learned the pride of ownership.  It is where I learned the glory of nature and how to take care of her.  It defines me in the purest sense.

Thanks Dad for all this and so much more.  How about I take you fishing some time soon?

Happy Father's Day.