P – Parades and Pike

Parades – “I love a Parade” Music Man, 1927. That song could be my theme song. I don’t know what it is about parades but I so enjoy BEING in them. I was in my 1st parade when I was in the 3rd grade. It was the 4th of July Bike parade in our neighborhood. My sister, brother and I were dressed up as the fife and drummers of the Spirit of 76. I have paraded on a National Scale with a competition Majorette and Drum Corp. I have paraded on the local level with Jr. High and High School band. I have paraded with my church and now I participate in parades to get my brother-in-law the politician elected or re-elected. It doesn’t take much to get me in a parade. Just ask. I don’t know what it is but I just love being in a parade.

Pike – I grew up in Michigan. Starting in about the 7th grade my family would take our vacation and head off to the Northern Peninsula where we would rent a cabin and spend at least a week fishing for Pike, Northern Pike. I have so many memories I could share but the best one is probably the 1st one, our first night ever, first night of fishing for Northern Pike. My dad had rented a 12 v-bottom boat with a 5 horse motor stuck on the back. That first evening my dad took my younger sister, who was about 8 at the time and myself being about 13 at dusk we set off to a patch of reeds along the edge of the channel. We dropped anchor and started to fish. Now I had fished before, caught many, but mostly perch, bluegills and a few lake trout, nothing over 8 inches in length. That day we had stopped at the hardware store to get my dad a fishing license and the tackle, Red & White Daredevil Spoon with 12” steel leaders. I had only fished with worms and minnow prior to that. We also found out that anything under 22” had to be thrown back, WHAT 22” that is a huge fish. We had just barely arrived in our spot and stated casting our lines when my dad hooked his first Northern. He is really fighting this fish the line plays out and he is cranking the handle when all of a sudden he yells for me to grab the net. WHAT? Grab the net what net? I started to panic; finally I get a hold of the net and start to edge of the boat. I look over the side just as the fish comes to the surface. I almost jumped out the other side of the boat and my little sister is sitting on the very front and if she could she would have walked on water. My dad again yells for me to get the net and scoop up the fish. Not knowing what to do I dip that net in the water and go at the fish front on. Now anyone who knows fish knows that when you put a net in their face they don’t like that. You should if possible net them from behind.

So I have this fish in the net, just in time I might say as I lift it into the boat the hook becomes dislodge and the fish starts to flip around in the net. This fish is 30 inches long, almost half the size I am. There is no way this one is getting away so I fling that net upside down on the bottom of the boat trapping the fish in so it can’t get away. Well with all the flinging I also tangled those three prong hooks on my dad’s lures into the net so badly that we were done fishing for the night. My dad was so excited, frustrated and angry all at once. To this day my mom talks about my dad loudly explaining how to net a fish, she was across the lake and could hear him. Needless to say I learned to just hold the net up until he could grab the fish and he and I spent the remaining summers of his life out fishing together for pike each year on vacation.