Cast:

• Wife: patient, supportive, loving, long-suffering
• Children: 7, 4, 2, 5 months – prone to mischief and getting filthy, very cute
• Husband: sometime fly fishing writer, even less-time fly fisher

Scene:

Picturesque New England beach. Afternoon. Springtime. Bluebird skies. Low tide.

Striped bass present.

A family outing, with picnic dinner packed. Fly fishing gear stowed away in and among pasta salad, beach towels, and diapers.

Act I

Wife and children explore tide pools, looking for shells and sea glass. Husband walks out into the waves, fly rod in hand. He sees something shimmering on the ocean floor. Kicks at it with his foot, but it seems to be stuck between two rocks. Is it a piece of sea glass? undetonated munition?  PBR can? It doesn’t come free. Kicks harder. It doesn’t move. He rears back to really give it the business when a wave hits. Water pushes him precisely when his right leg is at its apex, leaving him off balance and leaning backwards. Each rock he steps on seems to be sloping away from him. After ten comical steps, he falls on his posterior. The cold, May sea water rushes in. He’s soaked on one half of his body. To the toes. Stands up, looks around, sees his wife giving him the thumbs up.

Act II

Husband regains composure. Strikes out with an optimism only the recently baptized could muster. Ties on a fly. After tying on the fly he realizes he has sinking line on. Overkill for the situation. Between the fall and the kids being on timers back on the beach, still decides to give it a go. First cast is ugly. Second cast hooks a large, undulating mass of ocean vegetation. Third cast falls apart, as he is stepping on the line. Fourth cast, there is a loud thwack and a sharp pressure on his sternum. “I’m shot,” he thinks. Looking down, the weighted minnow pattern is dangling from his waders. Fancy waders are now breathable and vented.

Act III

Resigned that fishing is not in the cards, he turns to head to the beach. Wife is walking toward him at a quick pace. He sees all four children, so nothing seems urgent. “He’s pooping,” she says. Scanning the beach a second time, he notices one child squatting in a tide pool. Other beachcombers are drawing near to his position. Handing his fly rod to his wife, he scampers over to run interference. The environmentally conscious angler, he takes care of the situation.

Epilogue

Husband, as narrator: This is why some days you take a picture of your fly rod on a rock. You don’t catch fish. You don’t even just get skunked – you get poo’d. But that is okay. Because you get to eat dinner with your family. You find sea glass with your boys. There is an amazing place just miles from your home that you and your wife both love. And even though you didn’t touch one today, you know there are striped bass just past those slippery rocks.