My brother in law was going crappie fishing the other day and got me to thinking about a fishing trip Jeff and I took. He was a little fellow when we went. It was a beautiful day, we packed up a lunch, snacks and drinks and headed to Carters Lake. We was having a great day fishing. Jeff had caught quite a few fish and he was really proud of himself. I had been spending my time helping him and hadn’t caught many fish. He started kidding me about how he was out fishing me and caught a lots more fish then me.
So I decided to start doing some fishing and let him fish alone to try and catch up with him. After a little bit I noticed he was just setting there not fishing. I asked him if he was tired of fishing and he looked like he was about to cry. I asked him what was the matter and then it come to my attention I didn’t see his fishing rod so I asked where it was. He started to cry a little and that’s when I realized he had went to make a cast and the rod slipped from his hand and went in the lake.
So I asked him if he lost his rod in the lake and then he started to cry. I told him not to worry about it, we’ll get it back. If you’ve ever been to Carters Lake it is a man made lake in the mountains and is a very deep lake. Being in the mountains the sides of the lake are very steep. You can be 10 to 15 feet from the bank and be in 40 to 50 foot deep water.
Luckily we were anchored down at the spot where we were fishing, so the boat was still in the same place that he lost his rod. I took my rod and tied on several treble hooks and put some heavy sinkers on it and started dragging it along the bottom trying to hook onto his rod.
I did this for quite some time and then I hooked onto something. I didn’t know if it was a tree limb or what but I started reeling it in. When I got it to the surface low and behold it was his rod and reel. Jeff was so excited, he didn’t really think I could get his rod back. I had my doubts about getting it back but I had to try and I got real lucky that day.
We continued to fish the rest of the day. When the day was over Jeff ended up catching more fish than I did and he was so proud of himself. You can tell by the pictures he was excited about his catch. We didn’t bring home all the fish we caught, just enough to have a meal. Which we filleted the fish and had them for supper. Jeff loved to eat fish all his life.
I still have his fishing rod he lost and got back that day. He’s had several fishing rods since then. But I held onto that one, it had special memories for me. His reel looked like Shamu. Not only did he lose it and get it back but it kept me from fishing and he out fished me that day. Something he reminded me of for a long time, the day he beat his daddy fishing.