To Fish or Not to Fish

My husband,Red, doesn't take hints. For instance, if I want him to give the kids a bath, I can't say, "I have so much to get done, but the kids really need a bath. I wish they were old enough to give themselves a bath, because then I could do the dishes while they are bathing. I'm  beat after working all day, I wish I had ten minutes to sit here and close my eyes--but then the kids wouldn't have time for a bath." Red would simply remain reclined on the couch, perfecting his slug impersonation.

I have to give very specific instructions, "Red, can you fill up the tub with water, take off Chatterbox's clothes, put her in the tub, wash her with soap, get her out, dry her off, put the towel in the hamper, drain the tub, take Chatterbox to her room and get her pajamas on?"

Oh, but even those instructions aren't quite perfect enough. He would say, with a confused look on his face, "Can I?"

And I would have to say, "I meant, WILL you?"

 "^&%$*^#&!!!!!!"

So, when I wanted a fly rod for Mother's Day (last year), a game warden I work with called Red on the phone and said, "Red, get your wife a fly rod for Mother's Day. That is what she wants."

It worked! Then it sat in the package for two years. Until today.

It is my only weekend off this month, so we drove up to my parents house for a visit (AKA a built in babysitting expedition). My location is still undisclosed, but let me just say- it isn't trout country. My only hope was to try for panfish.

Here is a list of my catches:
1. A tree
2. A stick
3. The back of my shirt
4. The line
5. The back of Red's shirt.

Here is a list of what I didn't catch:
1. Fish

Red is a pretty good fly-fisherman. In general he is very good at pretty much anything he does (except taking hints from his wife). He is a perfectionist-check out the kayaks he built in the photo below. When we have remodeled rooms in the house, after I spent an entire day spent re-painting the bedroom, Red would waltz in after getting home from work and point out all the paint drips that I missed. In retrospect, he probably wasn't the best choice for a fly fishing instructor. But he was all I had since I forgot to pack the instructional video that came with the rod.

Red's actual instructions weren't bad...it is just that his gaze made me nervous. He got out his fly rod and started fishing, but he kept looking over at me. He had that pained look about him like he was struggling to hold in criticism. Or like he had an acute attack of appendicitis.

Finally, after watching Red catch two bluegills and a smally, I sat on the park bench (no mountain stream for us) and untangled my line, intending to call it quits for the day. He came over, probably feeling a little sorry for me and asked, "So do you like it...aside from not catching anything."

I said, hoping for a little sympathy, or maybe a kind word, "Well...I wish I knew what I was doing wrong. I'm embarrassed by my form-I obviously need practice."

He didn't take that hint either. He just nodded.

So, unlike all the other great fly fishing blogs (of which I am extremely jealous), there will be no cool photos of a trout grabbing a fly under the surface of the water, or me kneeling down and holding my beautiful catch for all to see. Nope. I'm tempted to post the picture that Red took of me fishing, (after I said to him, "It would be nice to have a picture of me trying to fly fish for the first time." And after he looked at me blankly, clearly not taking the hint, "Red, take a picture of me.") but I'm worried that my form is so bad, I will lose the few readers I have on this blog, who will no longer take me as a serious outdoorswoman.

The one thing I haven't told Red yet is that I AM HOOKED. I might hint about it tomorrow morning.

OFF with You!

Ok. This is not funny. Except that it is. In a dark, cop-humor kind of way.

Dispatches to wildlife areas are not always about poaching. Sometimes people get lost. Other times people are cooking meth. There are times when someone is stranded in a boat. Sometimes people go off-roading. And there are times when someone tries to commit suicide.

In this state, much to my chagrin, people can camp in a wildlife area without paying. They may not even be hiking, birdwatching, hunting or fishing. They may be homeless. Or they may be on the Sex Offender Registry and "unable" to find somewhere "safe" to live. So, they (and I am generalizing here of course...don't mean to profile or anything) take there belongings to a parking lot in the wildlife area, pitch a camp and light a bonfire. Then they start drinking Busch Light. Why Busch? I don't know. All I know is the last time I drove through the biggest wildlife area in my territory I counted the boxes of thirty three empty cases of Busch Light strewn along the roadway.

Last night, just as I was getting Towhead into bed (he is fully recovered by the way), I received a call from dispatch, "Can you go out to "Big Castle" (the wildlife area with a fake name)? We received a 911 call that someone tried to commit suicide with an Off can in a parking lot across from the boat ramp. We have an ambulance en route, but the deputy wants you to respond."

"What do you mean, with an Off Can?"

"Like with a can of Off."

As usual, the dispatcher was less than helpful. The only Off cans I knew about were of the insect repellent variety. So I went.

I arrived to find a sheriff's deputy wandering the wildlife area roads in his squad car, searching for the right location. He was lost- no wonder he wanted my help. The ambulance however had better luck- they had reached the scene and loaded the patient before I even stepped out of my truck.

The parking lot was strewn with junk (including some Busch boxes!). A dirty green tent was pitched near the back of the lot and a campfire was smoldering in a makeshift ring in the middle. A middle aged woman was sitting in a lawn chair smoking a cigarette. Tied to a tree was a little black and white dog.

The deputy and I approached her and asked what had happened. Long story short- she and her sex offender registered son were "staying for while" at the wildlife area while they looked for a suitable (legal) place for them to reside, where they were outside the required distances from schools, daycares etc. She started complaining, "This is the only place we can live. We figured we couldn't bother anyone out here." I begged to differ.

Anyway, she and her son had a little drunken spat. In the end, her son was forced to pull the guilt card on his poor old mom, by raising the can of Off insect repellent high into the air and proclaiming something along the lines of, "You made me do this Mom!" Then he tossed the can of Off into the fire and leaned over fire- arms spread-eagled, hoping to bear the brunt of the explosion in his face, ultimately causing his own tragic death.

Except it didn't work.

Turns out Off insect repellent (or at least the 3/4 spent can he tried to use) didn't carry the bang he longed for. It poofed in his face causing some burns. But he didn't quite get the drama he was shooting for. Nothing along the lines that would cause him to go down in history as the martyred sex offender son of a drunken, abusive mother.

The deputy gave the mother a ride to the hospital in his squad car. The mess in the parking lot was left for me. They never did come back to claim the dog, or their belongings. The dog went to the animal shelter where it was hopefully paired up with better home, and the dirty green tent and all its contents went into the dumpster.

Lesson one can gain from this story? Not much, except that Off cans in fire do not make effective tools for suicide. All you get is a burned face and maybe, if you are lucky, life-long repellency from mosquito bites.

Wilderness Refuge

“It was my university, my theater, my refuge and strength. When I rejoiced, I went there to celebrate; when I was sad, to be consoled. In every weather, I worshipped there.” – Paul Gruchow

One thing was very evident from the moment I became a mother. Kids have a way of screwing up your plans. It didn’t matter that I had four hundred and twenty two things I needed to get done today. It didn’t matter that I my work phone rang twenty one times today (no- I’m not exaggerating). It didn’t matter that I up until this very moment, I didn’t have any peace and quiet.

Towhead woke up with a raging fever. His cheeks were flushed, his ears were red, and he was bawling. It was quite clear that my sweet little boy felt like shit. Nothing makes a mother feel quite as helpless as a sick child. Aside from timely doses of ibuprofen there was nothing much I could do except put aside all plans of getting anything accomplished and hold little Towhead all day long (or at least it felt like it was all day).  

After reaching a fever of 104, I took him for a field trip to the doctor. Going to the doctor at a teaching hospital is not fun. I think it is possible that it is less fun for the mother than the babe. The clumsy resident that we were forced to see before the real doctor would come into the room, tried (for way too long) to fish chunks of earwax out of Towhead’s ears so he could determine whether there was an ear infection.  As Towhead wailed like a banshee, Doc Jr. kept looking up at me and whispering, “Very sorry, still can’t see.” Finally, worrying that he would pierce Towhead’s eardrums with his little earwax digger tool, I told him that we would just wait for the real doctor. “Yes, very sorry. Very sorry,” he said as he slunk from the room.

After Doc Jr. left the room, I paced back and forth. Just when I managed to stop the steady flow of tears running down his cheeks there was a knock at the door. It was Doc, Jr. again, “Um, I’m sorry. I guess I kind of forgot to finish the exam. I still have to get a throat culture and palpate his stomach.”  Needless to say, this didn’t instill any confidence and the day went downhill from there.

You are probably wondering how all this ties into the quote that started this post…it was bedtime. Red had to work late (of course, conveniently had to band some doves on the night I needed him home!). I managed to get Towhead to sleep. Then it was Chatterbox’s turn. She is more challenging. She won’t stop talking and she has a bedtime hug/kiss/butterfly kiss ritual that takes at minimum 10 minutes to complete.

I read her a few stories and turned off her lights and lay down next to her. And then it happened—it was quiet for ten whole seconds and we heard the cicadas.

The long, pulsating drone took me back thirty years, to trips to my grandma’s house. We always went in July-prime cicada time. I slept in a bed next to my brother and listened all night to the chorus outside of the window. At first the sound only brought a trickle of tenuous memories, rusty from disuse. They slowly started to come faster in a strong rush, full of sights, sounds and smells. I remembered the morning smells of fried eggs on the gas stove, the sound of Grandpa listening to a Cub’s game, the sound of Grandma and my mother talking and laughing at the kitchen table, and the smell of the musty old basement where my brother and I dug through boxes of old Mad magazines.  I remembered Grandma’s yellow bedroom, the lacy curtains in the room my brother and I sometimes slept in, the smell of Grandpa’s pipe, and the laughter of my brother watching Bozo the Clown on the old console tv.

My point is that it need not be a towering mountain range, a raging ocean shore pounded with waves, or a million acres of pristine wilderness. Something as simple as a cicada can create a place for my mind to escape. Maybe next time it will be the smell of an old brown oak leaf that will give me a little peace in a hectic day. Something will remind me that the search warrant that I needed to serve today, the phone calls I needed to return, the wildlife area I needed to drive through, and the pile of laundry that needed to be washed don't rank anywhere near my kids on the list of priorities.

My little blonde girl was lying next to me, her hair a tangle on her pillow and her left eye shaded in a birthmark that surrounds her eye and creeps down her cheek. I told her about the cicadas. She smiled when I told her to listen to the cicadas outside her window and think about me, when I was her age, lying on a bed in my Grandma’s house and listening to the cicadas outside the window.

Darth Warden

It is evident that I suck at pretending. I can handle playing store with Chatterbox or pretending that Towhead is a dog so he can fetch stuffed animals...but when it comes to game warden training, I will never win an Oscar. Unfortunately "scenario training" is a big portion of any career in law enforcement. Whether you are a city cop, a state trooper, or a conservation officer, there will surely come a time when you will have to put on your uniform and "play cops and robbers" with the boys.

There are a few problems with scenario training...namely that the scenarios that trainers come up with are never like real life. The most recent training scenario I took part in was at our statewide training session.

At first I was encouraged because we were told to pick a partner. Usually we have to do scenarios alone while everyone watches (and heckles). Being one of the lone females, I usually have to secure a partner before it is necessary, so I'm not left standing there like the last kid picked in gym class. Luckily I thought ahead and had already my neighboring officer, Smithy, to be my partner in case we should ever need one during our training weekend.Smithy and I get along well out in the field, and I work with him quite often, so I figured the scenario would be a piece of cake--I would just make him do all the talking.

When it was our turn, we went to the training area (located behind a truck that was hooked up to a big camper) to get the instructions from the trainers. That is when things went downhill.

It was raining, so all of us (the three bad guys-which were actually other game wardens, Smithy and myself) were wearing our raingear. All of our raingear is state-issued, and therefore, identical. Mossy Oak Camo pattern. I knew that it wasn't going to go well as soon as they started strapping knee pads, elbow pads, and a Darth Vader mask, and helmet on all of us, including the bad guys.

Here were our instructions: You have just arrived at a deer camp. If you go outside the cones you are out of bounds. Just do what you would normally do. That's it.

Then they took away our real guns and gave us "Air soft" guns, which are basically paint guns that hurt when you get hit.

My first mistake was not looking for the cones before starting the scenario. I was too busy arguing with Smithy about who was going to be the primary officer (the one who has to talk) and who was going to be the secondary (the one who stands there and makes fun of the one who talks).

I lost the argument.

When you go into a deer camp wearing elbow and knee pads, a facemask and helmet, you have to fight the urge to pull your gun in the holster. It just seems like something bad might happen when you are surrounded by four big guys dressed in identical camo who look like they are about to de-fuse a bomb. BUT, you are supposed to "do what you would normally do." Normally I don't draw down on a group of deer hunters unless they give me a good reason to do so. In real life if they were wearing those outfits, in my book it would qualify as a good reason.

So, Smithy and I stepped from our trucks and walked into the camp. While the bad guys and I were in the midst of our fake conversation, I found an untagged deer and Smithy found a loaded rifle leaning against a tree. Smithy ordered them to move away from the rifle so he could walk over and get it unloaded. I thought that we were in the clear...obviously the point of the scenario must have been that you needed to find the weapon and clear it. I was wrong.

After the gun was unloaded, I asked to see their deer tags. Bad Hunter 1 displayed his license, Bad Hunter 2, who was sitting by the campfire cleaning under his fingernails with a machete, said his license was inside the camper. Smithy, being the observant officer he is, noticed the machete and told him to put the knife down. Bad Hunter 2 didn't want to put the knife down. Smithy gave him the order again. This time Bad Hunter 2 made a run for the camper.

As Bad Hunter 2 ran for the camper, I started running for cover. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Bad Hunter 2 grab a rifle from inside the camper. I screamed "GUN!!" at Smithy, and Smithy made a dive for the other end of the camper. This wasn't good. Now, in order to shoot Bad Hunter 2, Smithy and I would be firing towards each other. On top of that, I wasn't sure if I was out of bounds. I stood there trying to ask the trainer if I was still playing by the rules, all the while taking fire from Bad Hunters 1 and 3 who must have pulled handguns out from inside their raingear.

As I felt myself getting pelted with bullets, I fired back at Bad Hunter 3. Finally Bad Hunter 3 fell to the ground and pretended to be dead. Still the trainer wouldn't answer my question about the cones. I guessed that meant that I must not be out of bounds.

Meanwhile, one of the trainers started yelling at me, "Can that rifle shoot through the camper?" Umm..yeah. Just as I was about to run for cover, someone came up behind me. I drew my gun and pointed it at the man clad in camo wearing the Darth Vader mask. He raised his gun in response. Just as I was about to pull the trigger, I  realized it was Smithy. Luckily I didn't shoot him.

The trainers blew the whistle and the scenario ended.

We were gathering around for a debriefing when one of the trainers asked me if I was ok.

"Yeah, why?"

"Look at your hand," he said.

I looked down and saw that blood was gushing out of my finger and running down my hand. It was swelling up rapidly and looked nasty, covered in the tell tale blue ink of my partner's gun.

Smithy was standing off to the side of the group looking like a dog who had just peed on the carpet.

"Sorry," he said, "I didn't know it was you. I can't believe I shot my partner."

He will never live this down.