As I rapidly approach that age people like to tell you lifebegins, I find nostalgia playing a more important part in my fishinglife.
This obsession is the reason I’ve been turning my mother’s garageupside down lately, looking for a certain old float. A special float,not a good one, or one I would use now, but special to menonetheless. I thought it would be residing with the other bits andpieces of obsolete tackle that are still to be found there eventhough I’ve been married and moved out for fourteen years, and myfather who was my fishing partner in those early days has been passedaway for even longer.
So what is so special about this float? Well nothing really. Infact we found it in the grass by some local ponds when MiddlesbroughAC took them over in the early 70’s. Even thirty years ago this floatwas obviously a product of a different generation. It would have beenno more than four inches long, and made of, I suppose balsa. Howeverit was so heavily painted, and varnished that 2BB would have sunk it.Lime green in colour, with only the top quarter of an inch orangeblaze, and a thick black band dividing the two colours. The top wasflattened off, while the bottom tapered away like a traditional stickfloat. Screwed into the bottom was an unsightly ring whose rustynature gave away the float’s age. But in those far off formativeyears when the choice of float depended more on what you fanciedusing, rather than what it was actually meant to do, this was ourlucky float, and we’d take turns using it.
Another reason why I was so keen to find it is that in my mind’seye that float was synonymous with one of the most important days inmy fishing life, a day so steeped in personal folklore that it’s nowdetached from reality, and firmly embedded in legend.
This goes back to a time when a lad and his dad, neither with muchangling experience, would consider a day when we caught a fish to bea good one, two would be a triumph. Of course these meagre returnsnever dampened our enthusiasm, and this particular day in questionwas even more exciting, because it would be the first time we’d gotup at the crack of dawn. This wouldn’t have been a problem, as Idoubt I would have been able to sleep.
The day itself was a classic. Arriving at the ponds (where wefound the float) before the sun broke the horizon. There’s somethingspecial about a summer sunrise. A cold, frosty winter’s morning, withthe sun breaking the mist is nice, but it happens so late in the daywhen most people are up. In midsummer the dawn is so early you knowthere are few people about, it’s almost as if all this splendour is aprivate show just for you.
This particular morning was splendid, with the water steaming, thefish topping, and the coots, well…….cooting. We tackled upside by side, and our floats sat the same distance apart no more thana few rod lengths out, and he was using the lucky one. To ouramazement we couldn’t stop catching. Fittingly for a summers morningwe had some nice tench, the biggest we’d ever seen. We also had roachand perch of varying sizes. I couldn’t put a figure on the number offish we had, or the poundage, but that is of little relevance, we hadnever had a day like it, and to be honest we would never have a dayquite like it again.
That day was pure magic, and that old float was central to it.However time moved on, and so did I as an angler, gaining experience,fishing got (dare I say it?) more serious. Venturing into the localmatch scene, club matches and opens were followed by winter leaguesand national squads. There was no room for an antiquated little tenchfloat. So it was condemned to the nether reaches of the garage, andthe dusty old shoe box part of the memory.
I must admit I enjoyed all the time I spent match fishing, but nowthat “serious” side has become a thing of the past. I now find itincreasingly important for me to get in touch with those far offinnocent days. The lucky float would indeed be something tangible, amomento. Unfortunately it’s nowhere to be found. I can’t rememberlosing it or breaking it, it would seem to have just vanished.
Perhaps it was only ever brought into existence by the greatangling gods for a young boy and his father to find, and now havingdone it’s job of making two anglers for life has moved on. It may nowbe a carp waggler lying in the grass besides some commercial fishery,just waiting for some wide eyed youth and the process will startagain.
Alternatively all this could just be the ramblings of anover-sentimental fool, who’s just realised he’s getting on a bit, andis desperately grasping for the good old days. I’m sure there’s morethan a bit of that, but without the past we have no foundation forthe future. Without a little magic in our lives the world can be avery dull place.
Now the roles are reversed, and I am the father. I can only hopethat if any of my children follow the angling path, they too willhave memories like these, because they are the very essence ofangling.
So when people ask why do I go fishing, and what do I get out ofit, I like to think ‘magic’ and ‘memories’.
Magic, all the time I spend by the water, and memories so that inreflective moments, no matter where I am, I can transport myself to athousand sacred places.
One of which is a still summer morning just before sunrise, wherethe water is steaming, the fish are topping, and the coots arecooting.
