Salt of the Earth

 Pier fishing is at its best a roller derby of cultures and at its worst a clash of the Titans. You never know what to expect. I pulled up to the drive on fishing pier around 2:00 pm. Only a few cars about as I found my place for the evening.  Right now my only neighbor was a small Asian woman fishing her heart out with four poles, two on each side of the pier. For the next three hours while fishing I watched this woman scurry from pole to pole reeling in fish and checking her lines. After she was satisfied she would sit in her fold out chair with her back to the sun. She would adjust the small clamp on a shade umbrella and smoke a small cigar. Her constant up and down catching small fish, that I would use for baiting my lines, that sat steady and sitting still, having been cast out deep into the bay. She was amazing to me in her small dark features.  I could see she walked in pain, bent backwards like always being held back by some invisible string. Still she never tired as I watched her repeat this cycle countless times over and over. 

 After about three hours I walked over and introduced myself.  Her name was Rose from Seoul Korea and over the course of the evening we talked of life. Understanding her completely was very hard. I am very Alabama and she very Korean but our language barrier could not stop our desire to communicate. I would give her the extra bait fish I would catch and she would share a nugget of her life. As a young woman an American soldier had married her and they had a son. They were divorced and she raised the boy alone. It must have been very hard on her because even after 30 years in Pensacola her English was very hard to understand. I felt we spent much of the night repeating ourselves and I am sure Rose felt the same.  I learned her son had graduated college and was 24 years old. He had had a hard time finding work at first but had finally found a job. While talking with Rose I could see all the lines of the years driven deep into her face. Weathered hard lines by many long hours of worry and work, beyond those lines were eyes as bright as a newborn.  Filled with courage that I only wish I could possess.

 I wondered and thought in those moments alone watching the tips of my pole sway in the gulf breeze. How we all have our journey and how we are all alone with it. The peace of knowing that these moments if treasured and understood could be seen as not just miracles but a calling of being understood.  Rose told me I was a good son “She could tell”. Rose had had a stroke the year before. Her right side of her body had been paralyzed. She worked through it by fishing. The doctor told her fishing apparently was good for her. To myself I thought “well I guess so” and “now I know why she walks the way she does”. We all have strings pulling us and I could now see that Rose refused to let hers hold her back.  

(Fishing note: when you fish with live bait you cut the tail so they can bleed and attract the big fish you are hoping to catch). 

 About 6:00 pm a beast of a truck pulled in front of mine. It was loaded with fishing gear and an electric service chair. Out of the truck came a mountain of a man wearing confederate flag swim trucks.  From the driver’s side came an even larger man with long hair and beard. It only took ten minutes for us to be introduced because the driver had cast his line over mine. Within minutes we were conversing of fishing and life. The driver said “folks call me Bear” and I replied with “well of course they do”. Bear told me they were truck drivers taking a break for the weekend.  His friend Paul was the rebel with the swimsuit clause and Donnie was Bear’s brother who was paralyzed from the waist down.  As the evening progressed Bear offered me a beer and I accepted. As we indulged the subject of shark fishing came up and Bear said “well Donnie I think I will just rig you up and throw you over for bait”. Without a blink Donnie replied “well I ain’t got no problem with you throwing me over for bait but you gotta cut me and that ain’t going to happen!”  In that moment I saw that these two brothers had shared and dealt with so much pain in their life that the only thing left to do was joke about it. Courage, pain , peace, brotherly love, beer and fishing. 

 The next day driving home I was in the moment thinking about my to do list. Cruising up the highway with my future plans rolling through my mind. Traffic suddenly stopped to a crawl and I was already thinking of how the delay would affect my future plans when I saw it. A terrible wreck with a big rig truck off the road and crashed through a large tree. Slow in passing I saw people kneeling over someone as to give comfort.  I drove on knowing there was nothing for me to do. I thought of Bear the trucker I met the night before and Donnie his brother in the wheelchair. I thought of Rose and I prayed for us all, the Salt of the earth. The pain we all face. The hope we bring by not giving in to that pain. For hope in the inspiration of others we meet on our lonesome journey.

FTBAS 8.6.13