Mid Autumn 2012

A fine morning on the Chesapeake

Yesterday I met my friend Greg at his marina in Deale, Maryland, and we fished some of his nearby spots on his 17 foot Boston Whaler.

Naturally, he caught more fish, but I was happy with the steady action I was getting using a fly rod.  We were catching undersized rock fish but then got in to some sizable white perch which excited Greg because they're his favorite eating fish.  Even so, he generously gave me all the fish after he did all the fileting:

After finishing, we had sandwiches and beer at the local spot between his home and the marina.  Greg is good company and a fine fisherman who understands the benefits of learning the workings of a local environment.

Clarence at 3 months

We added him two weeks ago and named him for the late saxophonist from the E Street Band.

Music and Writing

"Some writers are curiously unmusical. I don’t get it. I don’t get them. For me, music is essential. I always have music on when I’m doing well. Writing and music are two different mediums, but musical phrases can give you sentences that you didn’t think you ever had."

I quoted the late Barry Hannah's words in a post on February 22 of this year, and last Sunday's NY Times contains an article by Oregon writer Aaron Gilbreath which presents a specific example.  Gilbreath explains how he learned concision and economy of style from listening to jazz trumpeter Miles Davis' music from his middle period.  Like most post-WWII jazz musicians, Davis was heavily influenced by the great saxophonist Charlie Parker, but by the late 1950's he had transitioned to a leaner style that "rather than squeezing as many notes and changes into solos as possible, Davis dispensed with clutter and ornamentation and pared his mode of expression down to one defined as much by the notes and phrases he played as by the silences left between them."

Gilbreath goes on to give samples of writing which reflects a similar economy but an economy of words rather than musical notes.  He believes this brevity strengthens the writing by  implying rather than stating directly, thus inviting the reader to speculate which tightens the bond between author and reader.  I'm not familiar with the authors he cites, Abigail Thomas and Tony Earley, but the passages quoted are certainly sparse yet powerful.

He contrasts these minimalists with what he calls maximalists like Hunter S. Thompson and Jack Kerouac, and says that he thinks young readers are particularly drawn to their "flamboyant displays" of prose.  The thought reminded me of the long ago advice of an English professor I mentioned in this blog on July 27, 2011.  This professor recommended reading Thomas Wolfe when we were young because otherwise we wouldn't read him at all.  At the time I thought this was a reference to Wolfe's (who died young) self-centered, arrogant yet vulnerable young protagonists and their point of view, but now I think I think the professor may have meant the extravagance of Wolfe's writing style.  I've sometimes thought that if I tried reading Wolfe again I'd get bogged down by the repetition of his lyrical passages and be thinking, "ok, ok, get on with it."

Gilbreath is dead on in his descriptions of the music of Miles Davis, and I too prefer his style of the late 50's and early 60's as demonstrated on the classic album Kind of Blue which should be issued to every American high school student.  It would strengthen and enrich us as a country if this were done.

 For further reading go here.

The annual Moo Cup fishing competition

It was this past Sunday.  Negative weather forecasts were at least partially responsible for a lighter than normal turnout from the Moo internet fishing group.  The rain held off until we finished fishing, so we ate and drank in the parking lot in a steady drizzle.  What the hell, we're all outdoor guys so we dealt with it.

For the second year in a row, my friend Tom won.  This year with a 52 pound blue catfish.

Fall colors coming in

In the park...

These were taken a few days ago, and even just today the same scenes look different.

It's that time of year.

The Breaking Point-Hemingway, Dos Passos and the Murder of Jose Robles

This was one of the many books that Pam brings home from her volunteer job at the local library.  The nonfiction I generally thumb through reading at random until I’ve exhausted my interest, but sometimes this interest is sufficient to cause me to read the entire book.  I got so engrossed in Stephen Koch’s story of how a murder during the Spanish Civil War in 1937 effectively ended the friendship between two major American writers that I read the book twice.

Ernest Hemingway had a pattern of renewing his artistic creativity through a drastic change in his personal life, and he accomplished this by changing the woman in his life.  He was in his second marriage and was undergoing a crisis of creativity when he met his new woman in late 1936:  “At twenty-eight Martha Gelhorn was radiant with self-possession and her own excellence, quite tall, walking with a swaying (some thought practiced) stride.” Gelhorn was very much part of the 1930’s generation of political commitment unlike Hemingway who was basically apolitical and up until then had viewed such commitment as the enemy of art.  When Gelhorn strided into his life so did politics, at least for a while.

In contrast, John Dos Passos’ creativity was not cyclical.  His books were popular and widely admired in the 1920’s and early 30’s, and he was intensely political.  Jose Robles, a Spaniard, shared Dos Passos’ left wing views, and the two friends became strong supporters of the Republic against the Fascist insurgents under Franco.  Dos Passos joined his friend Hemingway, who also backed the Republic, in Spain where Robles held an important position.

From the book I learned that the Civil War was actually three way because the Soviets, who supported the Republic with arms and manpower, regarded anyone like Dos Passos and Robles who were not Stalinists as much their enemies as the Fascists.  They manipulated Hemingway, who was clearly never a Stalinist, with the lie that Robles was killed because he was a Fascist spy.  Dos Passos never bought this story, and his emotional disagreement with Hemingway led to the end of what had been a warm friendship accompanied by their mutual admiration of each others’ writing.  The other casualty of the Robles murder apparently was, for Dos Passos, the quality of that writing because the author says that “The bullet that killed Robles also shot down the soul of Dos Passos’ art.”

In America there was also a war but one fought with words rather than bullets as in Spain.  Among the left wing intellectuals the bitterness among the Stalinists and the Trotskyites and others persisted for years after.  The Hemingway/Dos Passos conflict was a battle of that culture war.  I was surprised to read a reference to novelist James T. Farrell's political activities.  I read him avidly when I was young, but he has seemingly been forgotten by the public and critics.  George Orwell appears in a striking scene with Dos Passos.  Orwell fought with the Republic’s forces but hated the Stalinists and was angry with the democracies of the West for their nonintervention in the Civil War.

Hemingway’s artistic creativity was renewed, and the author considers For Whom the Bell Toll which came out of the experiences of the Civil War to be one of his best novels.  Dos Passos never again achieved the heights of his earlier successes, and the author writes that he “never got free of his entanglement with that enemy of art, mere political opinion.”

Early Autumn/Late Summer

Saturday: College Football

Watched Maryland lose to University of Connecticut.

Friday: National Cathedral

In the summer of 1974 I taught camping skills at a day camp on the Cathedral grounds.  In those days, there were thick woods directly behind the building, and coming out of them and beholding this Gothic structure was an odd sensation something like being transported suddenly to Medieval Europe.

I don't believe I've walked around the grounds since then, and many things change in 38 years.  The land is now mostly developed with parking lots and athletic fields for the schools associated with the Cathedral.  What remains of the woods is no longer wild but more of an urban park.  I tried to capture some of the feeling I once had with these two pictures taken from the same place.

First I photographed the Cathedral:

Then I turned around and took a picture of the
wooded parkland:

I was a little shocked to realize that those 6 to 10 year olds that I taught knots and fire making are now well approaching middle age.

Thursday: A geology field trip...

Examining different rocks used at the University.  This is a shot of the marble steps at H. J. Patterson Building.  If my notes are correct, it is a metamorphic rock containing many different minerals including quartz.  The penny is there to show scale.

Monday: A kayak paddle...

Up the Patuxent from Brown Bridge on Rocky Gorge.  Caught a couple of small ones and didn't feel like going up this set of mild rapids.

Takoma Park Folk Festival

We hadn't been in a number of years, and we couldn't have picked a nicer day to return.

Nice to hear live music:

                                                                       
      

Folk dancers parading in front of some of the food booths.

 Some interesting crafts, like these faces carved from wood.

 Women a cappella vocal groups from Bulgaria...

...and Latvia.

Joys of trolling

Although I'm mostly a fresh water fisherman I like fishing in the salt, and once a year or so I find myself on a boat trolling.  It's not my favorite way of fishing, but it has its charms.  On a good boat with a good captain and among pleasant companions, it can be great.

Yesterday was one such day.  It was the second time this year I've fished with Capt. Billy Pipkin out of Ingram Bay Marina on Virginia's Northern Neck.  His boat, Liquid Assets, is big enough at 43 feet to handle the sometimes rough waters of the Chesapeake Bay, and he's a skilled captain.

While you're waiting for a fish to hit it's very social, so good companionship is important.  My friend Joe drove down with me from Maryland, and my friend Capt. Dave was assisting as mate.  I had met some of the rest of our group on a trip earlier this summer and a couple were new to me but were friends of Capt Dave, and all were good guys to hang out with.

And I came back with a good supply of filets from the bluefish and Spanish mackerel we caught.

Going fishing is always the best decision

I don't think I've ever decided later that going was a mistake.  I've come home comfortably hot, cold, or wet and sometimes discouraged concerning my lack of success, but never sorry I went.

Yesterday I had almost decided to cancel my plans to fish the upper Patuxent between the reservoirs because the forecast was for the mid 90's and I was already hot after my morning old guy exercises, but I happened to glance at the thermometer shortly before 11 and it hadn't hadn't reached 80 degrees yet.  What the hell, it would only be a 20 minute drive and I could always return.

A half an hour later under the shade of the stream-side trees, I was standing in the cool water just over my ankles catching fish:  two small bass on a B&B and about a half dozen fallfish when I went deeper with a crystal bugger.  It's a small stretch of water, so I was finished with it in just over an hour.

Looking back on the week, Monday I caught almost nothing and yesterday it was mostly something commonly called a "trash fish", and yet I returned both times satisfied with good memories of the day.

First week of the Fall Semester

On Wednesday I was able to register at noon on the first day of classes which is earlier than normal for the Golden ID (geezer) program, but it was too late to receive the professor's e-mail that there would be no discussion classes that day.




Fortunately, outside the classroom there was a display of aquatic insects of the Middle Patuxent that was ideal entertainment for a Maryland fly fisherman.



The first lecture was yesterday and the course, "Evolution of Life and Environment on Planet Earth (And Beyond)",  looks to be interesting.

Tidal Patuxent

Having spent the past week getting in tune with the ocean tides, I apparently needed to wean myself away gradually because I found myself heading to one of the close to home tidal areas today.  Although I didn't check the  tables until I got home, my visit turned out to correspond closely with one tidal cycle since I arrived at Hills Bridge just after the low at 10:18 this morning and left about a half hour before high tide at 2:27 in the afternoon.

It was my first time with my new wooden kayak paddle, and I enjoyed using it very much.  Only caught one small fish although I had heard some promising reports concerning largemouth bass.  I guess I'll have to sharpen my tidal bass skills because although I hadn't been there in quite a while I plan to be returning.  It's a beautiful area which is amazingly wild considering it's only 20 miles from Washington, DC.

This year's beach house

We've had quite a variety during the 25 years we've been renting houses for the week in Bethany Beach, Delaware.  Some we've stayed in multiple times and others just once.  This year it was one of the better ones, and we're likely to try to rent it again.

It was larger than most we've had with two screened in porches, a deck which extended the full width of the house, and a huge living room.  Actually there were two living rooms with the smaller having the TV.  Having only three bedrooms was unusual for a house this size, but three are plenty for our family.  It was not on the beach, but the ocean was visible from most of the house.

The weather was excellent, and we had daughter and fiance all week.  Son Greg made it down for a couple of days.  We had friends Margaret and George over for dinner one evening and had brunch at their house in South Bethany yesterday before leaving for home.  Great week.

Summer fishing summary

Since it's getting close to Labor Day, I'm going to summarize fishing trips that I haven't mentioned previously on this blog.

-Three or four times I've fished from the canoe at Rocky Gorge Reservoir, and as usual only caught one or two bream on each of the short trips.

- Twice I've explored new places on familiar rivers and probably wouldn't return.  Once was on the Monocacy at Buckeystown where I did catch a number of bream and a small bass, but there's a park there which made the whole experience too public, especially since rapids discouraged me from exploring upriver.  Another time was downriver from my usual spots on the Patapsco, on parkland accessed off U.S. Route 1.  Not only was it also too public, but I caught nothing at all there.  Fortunately I had some luck upstream, so I didn't feel blanked for the day.

-Although I've been avoiding fishing the nearby pond this summer, I did go out once in the rain and had decent luck with bream, a largemouth, and a crappie.

-The day before yesterday I had another good day at Nolands Ferry on the Potomac even though the river level was higher than I prefer for the wading spots behind the island.

All in all, a good summer.

For Whom the Bell Tolls

I finished reading this Ernest Hemingway novel a few days ago, so I've been able to reflect on what I feel about it.  Initially I read it as a teenager, but I don't remember exactly how I reacted to it then.

Spoiler alert:  If anyone reading this thinks they may someday read this book and if knowing the plot beforehand spoils a work of fiction... read no further.

The action takes place over four days, and the young protagonist experiences during those days a lifetime of experiences and emotions.  The band of guerrillas in the Spanish mountains during the civil war become Robert Jordan's family and lifelong friends.  He first experiences romantic love with the even younger Maria and reflects as he faces his likely death that he considers his life as complete because of the intensity of the four days.

Like the rest of us Robert Jordan has his work, and he sometimes has to put his love for Maria aside to focus on that work which in his case is blowing up a bridge of strategic importance to the cause that he is fighting for.  There is his painful resignation that, "the world is a fine place and worth fighting for and I hate very much to leave it."  As an outdoorsman, Hemingway always provides the reader with  the sights, sounds, and smells of that surrounding world and makes us feel the sadness of anyone having to leave it.

Hot action on the upper Monocacy

Weather's hot and so was the fishing today.  In a little over an hour I caught 2 smallmouth bass and about 15 or 20 bream.  Hot fly was the B&B.  Bass weren't as big as I've been catching on the Potomac but jumped and fought well on the five weight.

This is the furthest up the Monocacy I've ever been.  Water level was 2.11 at Bridgeport and 1.83 at Frederick.

Hibiscus flowers along the Potomac

At least that's what I think they are.  Anyway, they're growing along the Virginia shore near where the Monocacy River flows into the Potomac.

I caught some nice smallmouth today, first on a chartreuse bullet head darter and then on a chartreuse wooly bugger which I lost shortly after.  I then tied on a white and red bullet head darter which also worked.  All fish fought well and jumped multiple times.

Levels were 1.79 at Point of Rocks and 3.17 at Little Falls.

The Spanish Civil War

As I frequently do, today I looked up historical events of the current date and learned that the Spanish Civil War began on July 18, 1936 although some sources give the date as the 17th.

When the civil war broke out, the existing government was a representative republic who were challenged by the Fascist insurgents led by Franco.  The civil war is often viewed as a prelude to WWII because Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy supported the insurgents while the USSR supported the Republican government.  In addition to the Soviet government, non-Spaniards, often communists or socialists, joined the opposition to Franco because they believed that the Spanish Republic was a front line in the general war against fascism.

 I'm currently reading Ernest Hemingway's For Whom the Bell Tolls which takes place during the Spanish Civil War, so this subject is on my mind lately.  The novel's protagonist is an American who is fighting on the side of the Loyalists, those who support the government, and is a member of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, the name given to this group of Americans.  The Abraham Lincoln Brigade became viewed by the American government as a communist front because of the large number of communist party members, and even 30 years later the organization's name still appeared on federal government job applications as a subversive group.

It's popular to comment about the polarization of current American politics, but a civil war such as Spain's shows that political polarization can be much more extreme.  The main character of For Whom the Bell Tolls is not a communist but accepts their leadership in the absence of any viable place for political moderates.  I'm sure that among the insurgents were non-Fascist conservatives who similarly allied themselves with leadership that they did not fully agree with.  Amidst the bloodshed everyone had to chose a side, and the voices of moderates from the political right and left were lost in the thunder of combat.

History is valuable in giving one a perspective on the present.

UXO pulled up with anchor

UXO stands for unexploded ordnance, and this one was brought up off the bottom of the Chesapeake Bay during a fishing trip Saturday.  The military has used obsolete ships as targets in a number of spots on the Bay in years past.  Holding the bomb is my friend Capt. Dave who is a retired charter boat captain in the Northern Neck of Virginia.

 
Besides the bomb, we also caught rockfish, blues, and croaker, but the fishing was slow despite the hard work of Capt. Billy Pipkin. 

He's an excellent fishing guide and an entertaining guy to be around.  His boat was very comfortable for the six anglers invited by Capt. Dave who organized the trip.  I had a good time.

Nice day at Nolands Ferry

View is upstream towards Point of Rocks where the water level was listed at 1.16.  Little Falls reading was 2.94.  Fished for a couple of pleasant hours and caught a nice smallmouth bass on a white Bullet Head Darter using an eight weight rod.

Wildflowers on my walk

Like many old guys, I'm walking daily for health and enjoying it even though I have to get out early on these hot days.  Every day I pass by wildflowers alongside a wooded area of the park.

Because the exercise requires that the walk is nonstop, I don't bring a camera.  A few days ago, however, I came back with one.

And, of course, when the lilies in the pond flower, they always attract my attention.

Overnight to Bethany Beach

Tuesday we drove down for a couple of days to take advantage of the perfect weather.  Pam took this picture the evening of the first day.

Past Potomac high water

 At the top edge of this picture is most of a plastic lawn chair that apparently came down river in a flood until it stuck in the branches.  The chair is about 20 feet above the current level of the river, and the tree is on Nolands Island upriver from the Nolands Ferry boat ramp. 

Yesterday's level was 1.80 at Point of Rocks and 3.21 at Little Falls.  I was there to fish and landed three smallmouth bass and one bream and hooked and lost three other bass.  Losing fish is common when fishing for smallmouths, but in recent years I've lost very few so I believe the law of averages caught up with me.  All of the bass but one were hooked on a chartreuse bullet head darter that I ordered from Joe Bruce of Westminster, Maryland.

June Fishing

Fishing at the pond has been very slow.  The only good outing was an evening a week or two ago when I caught two good crappie and a largemouth all within a half an hour or so.  It's probably key that it was an evening rather than an afternoon.  On the afternoon trips this month (2 or 3) the only catch was a small bass one day when I felt like fishing the 7 foot fiberglass rod that I haven't used in about 20 years.  In May I wrote that bluegills were pretty much a sure thing at the shallow end, but that certainly is no longer the case.

I did another trip this month based on wanting to use a particular rod.  That one was to Thomas Point Park because it is a close place to fish the salt with my 9 weight rod.  Didn't catch anything, but it's a nice place that I intend to return to.

Yesterday I set out to fish Antietam Creek near the Civil War battlefield, but it was high and off-color from a recent rain.  Instead I continued to the Potomac at Shepherdstown, West Virginia which was running pretty clear.  I didn't want to wade very far, but I did manage a nice smallmouth and a bluegill within a short time.

The June fishing trip to the Gunpowder is described on June 7th below.

Gormania, West Virginia

Spent a couple of days visiting.  Above is Pam, her sister Kathy, and Kathy's husband Bernie in front of Kathy and Bernie's home which is the house that Pam and Kathy's mother grew up in.





Their clematis plant was so handsome I wanted a picture highlighting it.












Gormania is very near the headwaters of the Potomac River, and the river flows a few feet in front of the house.

The House and Yard: Early Summer

 

Masemore Mill on the Gunpowder River

The agricultural mill was built in 1793 and is now a private residence.

Yesterday I fished the Gunpowder for the first time in a couple of years.  Although I got only one fish, I felt satisfied because the last visit or two I caught nothing.  The river is a nationally known trout stream, and being located near a highly populated area it gets heavily fished.  The trout have become very wary and hard to fool, so any fish caught is cause for pride.  The one I got fell to an old fashioned wet fly.  He was a brown trout of  only about 10 inches, but he fought hard on the  four weight fly rod.

I was concerned when I arrived in the parking lot in the late morning because it was filled with cars and was relieved to realize they didn't belong to fishermen.  There was a gathering of Maryland state troopers and men and women in business attire.  As I suited up in my waders, I listened to them planning an upcoming event that would be attended by the Governor and also heard mention of the name of the famous fisherman Marylander Lefty Kreh.  I checked into this later and discovered that a trail  along the river was to be named for Lefty and that next week there will be a dedication ceremony.

A Lesson Before Dying

Early in this Ernest Gaines novel the reader learns that a young black man in Louisiana in the late 1940's has been convicted of a murder he did not commit.  Racial injustice is not the primary story, however, because I believe a white man caught in the same circumstances and using the same disastrous judgment may have also been found guilty.  A white man would not have been compared to an animal during the trial, though.  Ironically, it was the defendant's own attorney who in an effort to save him from execution says there would be no more justice in killing him than killing a hog.

It is this comparison which moves the story forward as another young black man, Grant, is pressured into regular visits to the condemned man to convince him to face death as a man despite what has been said about him.  Grant is a contrast to the jailed man;  he is intelligent, educated, and attractive to the women of the black community.  He is also somewhat confused and indecisive about his own life and feels restricted by the limited opportunity of his economically depressed racist surroundings.  He often thinks of leaving with his married but separated pretty girl friend, but stays and continues his job teaching school which he finds unsatisfying.  As he gradually effects change in the prisoner, he also changes.

My complaint against some novels set in the segregationist South is that the characters are simplistic;  all the blacks are good and all whites bad.  Although Gaines writes using simple words and sentences, his characters are not at all simple.  The black characters are a mix of flaws and good intentions, and most of the whites are not so much evil as unquestioning of the society they were born into and its privileges to them and the injustices to others.  This is the way most people are in my experience.

A Lesson Before Dying is often taught in schools alongside the classic To Kill a Mockingbird.  The novels take place in similar Deep South locales, at times not far apart, and with an inter-racial crime crucial to the plot, but the stories are much different.  I very much admire them both.

More May fishing

Four or five trips, all to the pond except Friday, May 11 to the Patapsco where I caught my first smallmouth of the season.  Other than that, it's been all bream.  Been using sponge spiders the past two days.  I'm catching on every trip because on the shallow end of the pond it's pretty much a sure thing this time of year.

Daughter Rebecca receives Masters

Tuesday at the New York University's Institute of Fine Arts.

Short but pleasant trip to the Apple.  Good dinner Monday night in Brooklyn and lunch Tuesday on the Upper East Side.

Father looking all of 65 years and daughter a lively 28 years.

May Fishing, so far

Have been out four times and caught fish on each trip.  Two were short trips to the park pond, and I caught only a few bluegills.  Best day was yesterday at the pond when I caught two rainbow trout, one largemouth, and 6-8 bluegills all on an olive marabou streamer. 

Only other notable trip was last Wednesday, May 2.  That afternoon I walked over to fish the pond  and realized that it was in the process of receiving another stocking. As I watched, I began a conversation with the guy who appeared to be heading the crew, and he told me at their previous stop they had put in a couple of 10 pounders.

Now, how many times in my life am I going to have a shot a 10 pound rainbow trout? And at a 10 minute drive from my house? As I drove my brain starting working: Should I have exchanged the five weight fly rod for something heavier? Should I go back and get a net? Was the guy who told me the story having a good laugh with the rest of the crew about my gullibility? What the hell, I'll press on.

Northwest Branch goes under Route 29 at the fall line, and the stream descends very rapidly through a series of falls and rapids. It's an amazing sight for just outside the Beltway, and between the fast water there's some fairly deep pools. There were a couple of fishermen there including a guy my age with hip boots and a spinning rod who I thought I had seen at the park pond as it was being stocked.

Yeah, I saw some stocked trout swimming around in confusion, but none looked anywhere near 10 pounds. I fished for a couple of hours and didn't catch any of them. Oh yes, I did catch an 8 inch bluegill. Not for a second did I think I'd hooked a monster trout.