Something clicked and I was suddenly back there, 50 years ago, sitting on the bank of the Caney River, about four miles south of Bartlesville. Out in the middle of a pasture, surrounded by big trees, carrying two fishing poles and a paper sack containing all the tackle we thought was needed and another bag carrying stink bait, to catch the mighty catfish that we had convinced ourselves were living its life between the rocks and trees and bank.
Michael Jourdan (JER-dan) was 16, I was 15 and we had picked this particular late afternoon to cross this patch of land, we had no idea who might have owned it, and us in a 64 Dodge Dart with push button transmission it had a couple hundred thousand miles on its faded blue and bent body, as we wandered to the stopping place behind the evergreens.
Old boots, Levi's, western shirts with snap fronts, and our straw cowboy hats, a pole apiece and our pocket knives, cans of Skoal and all the valuables like billfolds were left behind in the seat.
It was flowing rather slow. We split up about fifty feet apart and took to drag lining the river, that was maybe thirty feet across and was flowing south. Draglining meant we would load up a hook with as much stink bait as possible, have a half dozen sinkers a foot or so up the line, and then cast it, let it sink, and hold the line there. The line would get real taut, and the pole would bend toward the line.
And then you sat. Feel the sweat bead up under your hat, run little trickles down to your neck. You would roll up your sleeves, tuck them in tight and then your arms would sweat. Your pole would move up and down slowley, and I would watch Mike's pole doing the same.
We sat there for hours. It probably wasn't more than ten minutes, but with nothing biting it seemed like hours. Mike would move down river, recast and I would do the same. He'd get hung up, go fighting the line, maybe it would break, maybe come loose, and I would follow along.
We finally came upon a spot where you could see the water running over the rocks and we both decided that the fishing must be better from the other side of the river. Michael was 5'5" tall and I was 6'4" tall. We were quite the pair and we decided the fishing had to improve from the western bank.
We grabbed up everything and started across, where the water ran fairly quickly just about my knees. It also ran quickly just about Mike's middle. We laughed, stumbled, kept our balance and made it to the other side. We resumed our fishing.
This went on for a couple of hours, the sun had dropped way, way down in the sky, and we had fished all of our bait gone. Mike called it a day.
What we didn't realize is how far we had managed to walk. We had walked a mile or two or three, down river. The sun had begun to drop, but down on the river, it fell from the sky, and the river grew dark. Darker than dark.
None of it looked the same. The water looked as though it had gotten narrower, the logs and rocks had magically changed shapes and size and levels to the water, and after a long walk it hit us both that we were going to have to cross back through the river. No light left above us, and the water was absolutely black at our feet.
It was the end of the earth. We had no idea where we were. There was not a light showing anywhere, and our eyes had adjusted right down to zilch.
Mike went first. I always thought it was because he was braver than me, and it hit me years later that he went first because he knew if he suddenly went under and started down river, I would catch him.
We wandered out in our blindness and the water snuck up to Mikes waist. Then as I watched and the water kept sneaking up on me, Mike was chest deep, had his pole above his head, and with every step was in deeper. That was when we saw the eyeballs staring at us. Ten eyes. All of them in an almost perfect circle, with their long and twisted snake bodies beating the current, all silently watching two or three feet away.
Whether it was sweat, river water, or various other bits of liquid, Mike hollered something, tossed his pole and began moving as fast as he could go, and I was in close second as we could see the bank on the other side rising before us. It took all of ten seconds for us to make the side and start walking up the shore, in the dark.
Fear, excitement, wetness, rattled out bones and shaking knees, boots full of water, one fishing pole short, we made it to the car.
No fish, no bites, and what became giant copperheadedrattlemoccasions with time and telling, and wet britches finding the seat covers of that push button Dodge all poured together to make this fishing trip one to remember.
Ralph Peck
Photo by Ralph Peck
Caney River
South of Bartlesville, Oklahoma
Comments