Strong Drink Take Ye... Not...

Copyright 2019 Erik Helm: Short Story, Fiction, Humor

 

 

Oh thou sinner!

 

The sermon

The parishioners to the Lutheran church in the town of Brule’ Wisconsin were a grim lot that Sunday when that memorable day happened. The motley congregation filed in silently, and sat with bloodshot eyes and sweating foreheads upon the notoriously uncomfortable pews that wobbled as one sat down, and creaked when one moved. Old Toivo’s hair had been combed and scrubbed, but was already coming astray with his twitching. The Paulson family, all 14 of them, were in the front with the patriarch, Linus Paulson trying to busy himself with the missal, his hands shaking from a wee too much brandy consumed at the Saturday festivities the evening before.

As the Pastor, Fr. Larsson panned his vision over the assembling devout; he reflected that today’s sermon was overdue. He blinked his rheumy eyes and nodded with a smile to Leena, the oldest of the worshipers, covered from head to toe in black lace. There were moans and coughs coming from the back, where the less pious and roughest sinners and recalcitrants of the area were packed together and fidgeting. Funny, Fr. Larsson thought to himself, how they always pack to the front and to the back, and leave the middle like an empty purgatory inhabited only by a few ghostly figures. Yes, they all were suffering the after-effects of potent potables. He could even smell them from the pulpit. So be it. The lord moves in mysterious ways.

Fr. Larsson looked at his watch, and then at his trembling hands. “Never again!” he mumbled under his breath, as he thought back to the bridge, and the birth of today’s sermon.

There was a conspicuous silence as the congregation followed Fr. Larsson out of the clapboard church, and shook his hand with a greeting and forced smile. As the parishioners broke into family groups and retired home to Sunday dinner or to Michael's tavern, the later a little guiltily, the questions were murmured, “What had made him do it?” After all Fr. Larsson was as fond of his spirits as he was of the holy variety. Didn’t he come every evening to Michael’s for a wee drop of something medicinal already smelling if he had gotten into the sacramental wine? Didn’t he toast them and their families, and even perhaps before leaving, sometimes even buy a round? Sure, didn’t he carry in his jacket pocket a bottle with no label half-filled with some sort of medicine against the cold fitted with a cork stopper? What had filled him with such brimstone and gall as he railed against alcohol and sputtered and spat the words from Proverbs and Ephesians at them? Was it hypocrisy now… or was it…? The thought of a repentant temperance-pastor and crusader gave them all a bit of a thirst, and the talk turned to what was to be done… if anything… or would it all just blow over in time?

 

Of delirium tremens and canoes

 

Ralph and Jake arranged their gear in the canoe carefully in order to prevent an imbalance. Duffle bags, picnic basket, cooler, and their fly tackle were strapped down as the sun rose over the birches and fir trees surrounding Stone’s Bridge landing. The two intrepid adventurers from the cities would be taking their first spring fishing trip down the Brule’ River for trout, and the May weather was perfect. Almost too perfect, Ralph thought to himself while glancing at the robin’s egg blue of the sky and the already warm morning sun. Perfect weather for a canoe trip, even if the fishing might suffer a bit.

There were a few splashes downstream against the weed beds as the trout showed themselves hungry and in pursuit of the mayfly nymphs that were climbing the waving fronds and hatching into little sailboats upon the glassy water. They launched the canoe after rigging up their fly-rods and pushed off, each taking turns at the paddle as the other cast to likely spots. The smooth flow carried them downstream slowly, and everything seemed to be in a nice rhythm that morning with the birds singing and swooping over the water, the splashes of trout, the whisper of fly-line making loops through the air, and the gentle hissing of the Brule’ as it wound its way sedately down toward Lake Superior.

Each angler began catching a few brook trout, and an occasional brown trout on the flies supplied at a local hardware store, and tied in a back room by a character called ‘Feather Betty,’ who also served the town as a sign-painter and local gossip. The trout sure liked her flies. They switched off on the paddle a few more times before rounding a bend and deciding to break the lemonade bottles out of the cooler. The May morning had blossomed into one of those rare spring days when the heat of the sun finally breaks through the wet of March and April and the foggy and cold memories of winter to release the denizens of the north woods from their many months of slumber. God it felt good!

Ralph handed a cold bottle of lemonade to Jake and they both drank deeply and dreamily. After the first mile or so of river, and six nice fat trout in the cooler wrapped in an old towel, they were casting lazily now, and more interested in just enjoying the spring day. A pileated woodpecker flew across the river and a kingfisher chattered, a young doe poked her head through a stand of cedars and drank from the river, and Jake spotted an otter slithering along the edges of the water. They began to get a hunger up for the cold fried chicken and summer-sausage and cheese sandwiches sitting in the wicker basket, but the only place to beach the canoe was up ahead a mile or so on a little sandy shore which offered a rustic public landing. No worries though, as the two anglers let the canoe float with the current, only keeping it straight by an occasional gentle stroke of the wooden paddles. Ralph even took off his shirt, and Jake let his bare feet dangle over the side to tickle his toes in the liquid mirror of the Brule’

Our two heroes were having a beer after lunch when Jake looked downstream and spotted an ominous dark cloud on the horizon. It is well known in those parts that Lake Superior, that greatest of the Great Lakes, with surface temperatures even on a sunny warm May afternoon under 40 degrees, is more than capable of making its own weather. Mariners more experienced with wizened eyes and calloused hands will head to a safe port rather than tempt fate with this inland ocean when the swells and clouds gather. Unfortunately when on a river…

“Hey Ralph,” Jake gesticulated with a shaky index finger, “Looky there!”

They stared at the advancing dark mass as the wind began to pick up, and came to the swift conclusion that they had better get the heck out of dodge as fast as the boat would take them. “How far is the takeout,” Ralph asked as Jake folded the river map. “About two miles… but river miles mind you, and there are a few rapids and ledges ahead of us.”

The two quickly packed up the picnic basket and cooler and pushed off downstream, this time with both men at the paddles, and using big strokes.

The front hit them and knocked them back upstream and toward the left bank after just half a mile was covered. The wind howled and the sun was suddenly shrouded from view. The temperature dropped by 30 degrees in a minute. They both knew they were in trouble.

As the front passed overhead, the winds died down just enough to allow the now worried friends to make progress down river. The trouble was that it was difficult to keep the canoe oriented properly. If it tacked just a little it caught the upstream wind and turned sideways. They began to fight every bend in the river when it started to rain.

Ralph asked Jake to hand him the green duffle bag. It contained his spare clothes and a sweater and rain jacket. He also told Jake that he had better put on his slicker as well.

“I didn’t bring one…” Jake said with slumped shoulders. “It was so nice out that I never thought to bring anything else but jeans and a shirt.”

“We can share,” Ralph countered, shaking his head. “I have a spare poncho in the duffle.”

Jake continued his furious paddling, propelling the canoe forward through some tricky ledges and fallen cedars. There was the sound of a zipper opening followed by a lingering silence behind him.

 

“Shit.”

“What… what does that mean…?”

“It means, my dear intrepid partner, that I grabbed the wrong duffle bag.” “The one with the sweaters, socks, and rain gear is back in the trunk of the car.”

“Umm… okay… so riddle me this… what is in that duffle?”

Jake turned away for a moment and twisted to look back as Ralph produced a large blob of colorful cloth.

“My kids costumes for the school play,” he explained, holding up what looked to be several clown outfits.

“What play?” Jake asked haltingly.

“Snow white and the Seven Dwarves,” was the reply.

“And…”

“And, we have here Dopey and Grumpy.” “My wife sewed them out of wool and felt, so at least they will be warm.”

“I’ll take Grumpy,” Jake stated. “At least it fits my mood.”

 

They back-paddled into a little eddy against the bank, and dropping the little coffee-can filled with cement that served as an anchor, quickly donned the too-small costumes. Jake looked at Ralph and started laughing, realizing that he had to be a mirror image in his Dwarf-suit. A huge gray fake beard that was integrated into his tall felt stocking cap hid Ralph’s face. Built into the side were huge fake ears. His arms stuck out from the costume from the elbow down.

“What?” Ralph asked with a smile.

“You look like… I don’t even know how to describe it!”

“You too, but even if we look like clowns, nobody will ever see us, and we are sort of warmer…”

 

They pulled the anchor and continued downstream, the drizzle soaking the costumes.

Before twenty minutes passed, Jake pulled the canoe over again, steering towards shore.

“What’s up?” Ralph asked.

“My hands… I can’t feel my hands anymore… they’re freezing.” “Hold up a bit, I have an idea!”

Jake rummaged around under the costume and triumphantly produced a small mason jar filled with a clear liquid.

“What’s that?”

“Moonshine!” “I bought it from an old Scot in the parking lot of the gas station.”

“You’re not going to start drinking?” Ralph queried in alarm.

“No, this is pure alcohol.” “We can burn it in one of the tin cups with a little cloth to act as a wick.”

Well, as ideas went, it might have been a desperate one, but it worked. Jake tore off and twisted a piece of his costume cuff and placed it into the tin cup, covered it with the moonshine, took a sip for good luck, and using his Zippo lighter, touched it off.

“I don’t see any flame…” Ralph commented as Jake rubbed his hands over the cup.

“It’s alcohol, the flame is invisible.” Jake replied, as both of them began to heat their hands over the impromptu fire.

They left the cup to burn out by itself on the center cushion, and shoved off downstream, their hands now toasty-warm. They had the bridge in sight as they rounded a bend in the river. The takeout was a couple of hundred yards past the old bridge. They would make it after all. That is when Ralph, in the rear seat, began coughing. Jake turned to look just as the old seat cushion, made of foam rubber and vinyl burst into flames and spewed black smoke that enveloped the canoe. The tin cup had toppled over and spread the burning alcohol. They began beating at it with their paddles, trying to put out the fire, and causing the now out of control canoe to spin in circles.

Fr. Larsson stood in a melancholy mood against the rail of the old bridge and took a swig from the nearly half-empty bottle of the best the still in Iron River could produce. He flavored it with crushed juniper berries from the bushes growing in front of the sacristy. One thing was nagging at him, and he came here to clear his head. He had no sermon ready for this Sunday’s high mass. It was bothering him, and so he was drinking and watching the river flow, letting his thoughts float away… looking for inspiration.

From under the bridge came a sound of swearing and banging, and the smell of burning brimstone. Emerging directly below him, Fr. Larsson, to his horror, imagined he saw what looked to be four clown-devils shouting at him and dancing around in a large fire that floated on the river. He closed one eye… now it was two clown-devils. He smelled the burning, and heard the incantations of the devils as they shouted. “Jesus!… Holy Christ!… Damn!" chanted the figures as they spun downstream slowly and out of sight.

 

Fr. Larsson took a long swig from the bottle and splashed some across his brow. He then made the sign of the cross, and heaved the bottle far into the river. Whatever he had seen, it couldn’t be real… or could it? Whatever the truth of that vision was that he saw on the river that day, one thing could be sure… if it was caused by the shakes… the D.T.s or by temptation, he would not touch a drop ever again! He crossed himself again, and wobbling back toward town, began to get an idea for a sermon after all. “By God, I’ll give ‘em hell, I will!” he shouted to a confused grouse perched above him in a tree. “By God I will!”

Sunday evening saw a certain lack of jocularity in the patrons of Michael’s tavern. The jukebox wasn’t playing, and the dice-cups were all alone at the end of the bar, silent. Silent too were the usual suspects seated at the bar and at the few tables, nursing small tap beers and looking sorry for themselves.

 

The door opened and the pastor stood there blinking. He walked slowly forward, his hands behind his back, acknowledging the silent nods with a tip of his head. He sat down slowly at the bar.

 

By now every eye was half-downcast in a sort of shame, but half-trained on Fr. Larsson, waiting for what might transpire. The silence lasted a full minute.

 

“What the devil are all you starin at? Haven’t you ever seen a repentant man before? Fr. Larsson bellowed.

 

 “Get everyone what they want, and make mine a double!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gas Station Flies

Gas Station flies on hand made leather fly box cover and Wolf-River rod circa 1975.

A number of years ago I drove to the Brule’ river in far northern Wisconsin, passing through towns on the way that held memories of youthful vacations. I had not seen this landscape in almost forty years. Back in the day, the mid-1970s to be exact, our little family of three and our defective Volvo would take an annual vacation by driving to see relatives ‘Up North.’

‘Up North’ was a catch-all phrase for going somewhere rural where men went when they wanted to re-visit what it meant to be a man: away from the city… a place of muskies and trout, deer and cabins. To a ten-year old boy it was something exotic fed and conjured by elders in tales punctuated by beer and smoke with the spreading of hands and arms in measurement. My ‘reality’ of Up North was absorbed and simmered gently during the timeless hours of childhood summers reading Outdoor Life and listening to Dad. When I closed my eyes I saw rivers, smelled pipe smoke, heard winds through pine trees, and imagined groups of men wearing red and black checked wool hunting jackets.

For my mother, Up North meant time to spend painting landscapes and visiting local art and craft shops. For my father, it was a time to re-visit his dreams. He was an armchair fisherman and outdoorsman, so most of his dreams would be unfulfilled. Much later in life, I came to learn that perhaps a man with dreams is already fulfilled…

In those summers sitting and listening to him talk of the north woods, names began to be whispered: Brule’, Namekagon, Wolf, and Peshtigo. These were rivers of legend, and I can still hear Dad’s voice as we peeked through the birches and pines in our first and only glance at the rushing holy waters of the Wolf River. Maybe just attending this church by visiting was as good as participating in the worship or fishing. I never will know for sure, but Dad lowered his voice to a whisper when pointing out a rising trout to a wide-eyed and eared ten-year old. We never fished, but what I caught that day will be with me always.

As I drove through the towns again, I was out of place in time. My snapshot of Up North was decades old. I couldn’t believe how much it had changed. Most of those small hardware stores, and mom and pop places had been replaced for the most part with a plastic sameness as Kwik e Marts grew like cancers on my memories.

Back home some time later, I was going through old fly-boxes owned by a Wisconsin fisherman. Many of the flies were patterns I didn’t recognize, and with my penchant for history and old-things, that takes a bit of doing. When I say ‘Old’ it is rather relative, for most of these flies were purchased and fished during my lifetime, in fact in the very period of those youthful vacations. Old is relative, but I was alarmed by the amount of gray in my beard this morning when I shaved; like rust on those hooks of those flies… 

These flies were not commercial patterns in the strict sense; they were ‘Gas-station flies.’ They were not perfect by any standard, yet some of them were. Tails were often too long or short, wings too bulky, materials set off-kilter, and heads too obese. They would never make the quality test of a modern overseas fly company today.

Maybe that is a good thing. Today flies are tied in an almost clinical perfection in Asia and Africa by people who have never seen a trout stream. That kind of perfection can be flawed in economy of scale. How many hundred dozen do you want? Regional patterns and local ties like I held in my hand slowly disappeared or became scarce in that economy. These were unique and like a mirror in time. They held a place on a map…

Back when these flies were created, every great river had a local shop. I am not talking about a modern fly-shop in any sense. These shops were often places that sold gas, bottles of cold pop, flasks of brandy and bourbon, and sporting tackle. They were small operations run by locals. In a rural economy back then, they could exist on a shoestring, or maybe by selling a few shoestrings.

When one left the city and drove Up North, one always stopped at the local shop to fill up the Buick, add a quart of oil, pick up a needed item forgotten or worn-out, and to find out the local forecast for the fishing conditions and see what ‘They were biting on.’ The guy you went to talk to always knew your name as you knew his. Norm or Stumpy would be behind the counter. The flies that were working would be in a cardboard tray on the counter. They were tied by guys that fished the river every day. They knew exactly what was working, and the patterns were made up on the spot. “The Woodcock Special’ may be a great stone-fly imitation, but it could also be because somebody’s brother shot three woodcock last week. These people hunted. Other than a few materials such as the hooks, floss, and hackle, the materials used most likely saw the front porch of a hunting cabin, and spent a few weeks in borax and salt. The flies smelled like wood-smoke and deer hair. You purchased a half-dozen of each and clipping them into the tin fly-box, knew that you had the hatch all figured out because you trusted an authentic local expert.

Authentic…

That word summons so many images and feelings in me as I close my eyes… because I was there. I may just have been a little punter, but little punters have big eyes. What I saw and experienced as I walked through these local ‘Sporting-goods’ stores was real, authentic, rural, honest, local. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was breathing in history along with the dust. Yes… dust. Much of the shelving was covered with a fine powdering of dust. It lay on the boxes of muck-boots, the barrel of nets, and on the tackle that was timeless. I have grown to like dust. Dust is the most authentic thing of all, for all life is made of it. To a modern retailer, these places would need a massive cleaning and refit. There were no merchandising standards other than “The hip waders are in the back aisle under the shotgun shells.” Fish mounts and old bowling trophies sat or hung crookedly. There was no product rotation, so as a kid, I could always find an old Daredevil spoon or cap-pistol that was priced sometime in the past decade, and would be cheap enough for a pestered parent to buy. If you asked for something, the owner would furrow his brows, ask his wife, and she would root through an old box and find it. It was like a kind of magic. Muskie plugs and bucktail streamers appearing out of the primordial lost spaces of dust. The clutter was beautiful…

The fly-fisher never used all those local flies, but it was always a part of consideration and good conduct that one made a purchase of a few things to support the local store. The excess flies got stored away and now sit in front of me along with a fiberglass fly rod made locally for fishing the northern Wisconsin rivers. It is an odd rod by today’s standards…

standards…

Standards that have in time made these purpose made rods look obscure…. but they weren’t.

This rod is a seven footer for a seven-weight fly line. Short and with authority. It was designed and built off a Fisher glass blank by a man who owned a local shop like this. It was and is the perfect tool for the rivers it was born on. It was designed for brushy rivers with big trout and sweepers and log hazards. Throwing big size 2 hex nymphs on the Bibon marsh at night and catching alligators of brown trout as long as your arm while keeping them out of the rushes and cattails? Here is your rod. This wasn’t the Missouri river, and not all rods had to be 9 foot 5 weights. This was a specialty rod. When we look at the history of fly-fishing, we see as we descend the map a growing myopia of fishing culture, equipment, and tactics. These were grown locally and fed on long studies and days a field. The Letort and her micro-terrestrials and the rods to match. The Au Sable and the midge rod and long boat. The Wolf and her huge trout and deep rocky runs grew the large weighted stoneflies that made the rod in front of me a necessity. Each local fishery grew in myopia then, there was no internet, and thank god for that, for if there was, Marinaro, Fox, Flick, and the other local experts would all be told that they were doing it wrong… Instead, the local tackle and flies grew in a vacuum of sorts. The river grew the fish, which grew the fishermen, who grew the fly patterns and tackle, which became part of our history and culture. Yankee ingenuity at its best.

When we hold one of these flies in our hands, we must be aware that there was experimentation here and serendipity. They were purpose-built by a tier who lived in a small cabin and traded them for gas and cigarette money. That kind of small economy and craft is what made America rich…. not monetarily, but culturally. These flies are a time machine, with rusty hooks, faded colors, and hackle chewed by bugs and fish alike, small pieces of gut and nylon attesting to memories made on the rivers. The rivers grew all of this. We are all children of rivers.

A fly is an artificial deception to the trout, but also a word that means to travel through the air. This spring, a few of these that are in better condition will do just that at the end of my rod, a fresh leader, and a fresh perspective into local history. The honesty of knowledge that led to their creation in less complicated times will still deceive the fish, but my memories from those childhood travels through the Gas station sporting-goods stores will never deceive me or fade. The hooks on these old flies may need sharpening a bit, but my memories are as sharp as ever. I can still smell the pipe-smoke and the dust….. I can still see the Wolf River through the pines and hear Dad’s voice… whispering.

Dedicated to my Father and all the other dreamers back in the day, To the moms and pops that ran these small shops, the flies and tiers, and to Joe Balestrieri, and Bob Blumreich who remember… Up North.

Copyright 2018 Erik Helm

 

Coming Home

 

 

 

Connections….

They define us, they bind us to our inter-relationships, they flow and ebb, break and reconnect our concepts of identity. They are everywhere, but only if we look for them.

 Thus it was a connection I sought on Wisconsin’s Bois Brule’ river. Although the desired connection was a bright one with a wild steelhead, one sometimes seemingly as elusive as a unicorn, there would be another connection that, when the dust had settled, became more important.

 Our journeys as anglers are never straight paths. We seem to stray or explore different approaches and desired outcomes in our progress on the water. Thank god for that, for as one old friend reminded me, “Exploring paths in the journey along life’s road allows us to take side-steps and wind and turn throughout the one-way trip, thus adding miles and miles to what otherwise might be a straight, quick journey to the inevitable end.”

 As I get older, I am slowing down, and the explorations and approach, the history and lore seem as important, or sometimes even more interesting than the fishing itself.

So I drove up to the river with a wagon full of cane rods and hand-tied flies inspired by antique Scottish patterns fished on the Dee and the Don. The main rod was going to be a restored and newly cut and spliced Sharps of Aberdeen two-hander. It started out as a sweet rod several years ago, but after getting the ferules stuck together rather permanently, it got chopped and spliced to @ 10 ½ feet. Finding a line for it was a nightmare, as I sorted through my huge box of spey lines, for it started out moderately soft, but as I taped it up, realized that now it resembled a Frankenstein monster, cobbled together and chopped and sort of stiff moving, much like Boris Karloff’s flat-topped rendition. I drove to the local muddy canoe landing on the Kickapoo river and fitted it up with a 4 ½” wide-drum Hardy Perfect reel from 1917. To make a long story short, it was like casting a broom stick. I finally put on an old 10/11 weight salmon line and was able to make it work…. Sort of.

 Stubbornness runs in our family, and I got a double dose of it. That is the only explanation why the rod didn’t get left at home. “I can make it work,” I justified to myself weakly and often to reinforce the error.

 The weather was remarkably warm and beautiful when I arrived ahead of our party and settled in for lunch and coffee, dreaming of the river while I sipped and waited for Barry, who would accompany my foolishness.

 Steelhead are often a beat down. Not necessarily physically, but mentally. Bright cheery and eager faces entering the water at first light can often leave it after a fishless day not speaking to anyone, full-of self-doubt, self-loathing, and completely lacking in the confidence that was over-flowing in the morning. Everything gets the blame; Tackle, the sun, the water clarity, leaves in the water, the choice of flies, and our selection of aftershave. The truth is that confidence is the most important part of the game, and it is all mental and as fragile as a newborn despite our best intentions and egos. I have fished for steelhead all over North America for years and years on storied rivers. One would think I was used to this, but when Barry picked my pocket by landing his first Brule’ steelhead behind me in the second run we fished, I started to experience the downward spiral into self-questioning, misery and defeatism that we call steelheading. His fish was a stunner. Wild as the weather on Lake Superior and chrome. Translucent fins too. All that was missing were sea-lice. Here was the McCloud strain from California’s tributary to the Sacramento River, and extinct there. Transplanted along with rainbows and stocked in the tributaries to Lake Superior, they were all wild fish now, a rarity in the world of anadromous fish. Thus the happy congratulations and high-five we give each other often decays as we want a fish too…. And the mental beat down begins in proportion to the beauty and rarity of the fish.

 I stuck with the Frankenstein rod, making it work through stubborn will and body strength until in the morning of the second day, we screwed up, and took the wrong path for the morning fishing. This led to poor water and crowds and a path which we stubbornly followed with hope that things would improve and we would find better water and less anglers (who seemed to appear out of nowhere as soon as we set our feet in the water). The path started to give out as we continued downstream, and we had to crawl and climb through the beaver-falls and clay banks, rods snagging on pines stub branches, our clothing covered with brambles.

 We spent five hours hiking through the forest tangle, fishing here and there and swinging flies for a few casts until the water petered out, only to find ourselves back at the next parking area downstream where the other two anglers in our crew had put in. We walked back to the car soaked in sweat, dehydrated and pissed off, and when the rest of the gang met up with us for lunch in the parking lot, found that they had success, and Lem had hooked and landed his first Brule’ fish literally on his first morning on the river ever. The mental beatdown was now riding on my shoulder like a chattering monkey. “You suck,” it kept blathering endlessly.

 I kept with the monster rod throughout the rest of the day, but the physical exhaustion and muscle fatigue and doubt combined to make me take it apart and put it away before nearly passing out. Both Barry and I skipped the big party on the river we were invited to, and silently ate dinner after visiting three restaurants just to find a single available table. Back at the motel we knew we had to come up with a plan to beat the crowds. It seemed that half of Wisconsin and Minnesota showed up that evening for the weekend fishing. We had to have a plan. Well, the plan just sort of developed all by itself. By going to bed early, we awoke early and refreshed, and opening the motel door to the cool air of false dawn light, found that the parking lot was still full of cars. Everyone had slept in.

 We hoofed it into waders, choked down a doughnut and coffee or tea, and drove like the devil for the stretch of river I chose for the morning fishing. There were only two cars in the lot ahead of us, so we geared up by aid of headlamp and chanced it.

 Here is where the connection begins. I reached for a single-hand bamboo rod, and took it out of its case. A restored Clifford Constable 9’ six-weight restored by my friend Joe Balestrieri, and matched by a Hardy Perfect reel of 3 5/8 inches; a special reel, but more on that later. I tied on the new fly that, get this, I had not fished yet, lacking in confidence.

 Sometimes things come together in just the right way to make the connection. I noticed right away that I was fishing better as the light began to increase and the water chilled my legs. My swing was in zen mode, the little corrections to fly speed just happening as I didn’t struggle to fight the gear. Before the light was fully on the water, my fly was intercepted with authority. I had hooked my second Brule’ steelhead, the one last year having coming unpinned due to user (or loser) error.

 The bonus was some drama. The steelhead moved back and forth in the run, with me not trying to place too much pressure on it and screw it up. Then as Barry watched, it exited the pool and the reel began to sing and screech and protest the sweet music of an old Hardy. The run ended with a sharp left-turn of 90 degrees and a rapids which as I followed, my fish took my line into the tree branches at the bend, to be saved by Barry, alert as always.

 By now I was convinced I was not gong to land the fish. There was another 100 yards of rapids to go, but all of a sudden, the reel stopped screaming, and the fish buried itself in a soft pocket of water in the middle of the maelstrom. I spotted a small sand bar under water to the side, and a landing plan was put together. Maximum strain was placed on the rod turned upside down to equalize tension and strain on the bamboo, and the fish was landed. A sweet buck with a small bit of rose flank for color. The beat down had ended. I was staggering around in relief and joy when it hit me. The reel was owned previously by the late Andre’ Puyons, angling legend, former president of Trout Unlimited, prolific teacher and tyer with ever-present pipe and Irish hat and co-owner of Creative Sports, a fly-shop in Walnut Creek, Northern California. Walnut Creek is just west of San Francisco, gateway to the Sacramento and its now land-locked tributary the McCloud River. My reel most likely fished the McCloud back in the day in the hands of Andre’ Puyons.

The fish I landed was a ghost, an anachronism not out of time but out of place and now in last refuge from extinction. We all got tangled up and met in a connection on Wisconsin’s Brule’ river. I could almost smell the pipe smoke. The reel had come home. Old Andre’ was looking down and cracking a wry smile from somewhere beyond the pines and the mists of the river. I felt it. God, I dig this sport.

They say you can never come home again. I disagree. The time and place might be a little different, the circumstances connected with crooked lines of geography and chance, but if one closes one’s eyes, we can see it, it is all around us. We are always home through the connections that entangle us.

The enigma rod

Fritz Schreck 8' 1" 6 wt rod and old Hardy reel with Irish salmon doubles

Part One, the Phoenix rising


“I have a rod for you…”

Thus it began the night before I was to drive up to the Bois Brule’ river in the pine and birch forests of Lake Superior to fish for steelhead. Packing and final preparations such as shopping for supplies and groceries would have to wait. I got a call at work from friend and bamboo rod guru Joe Balestrieri, and when he found out that I was driving to the Brule’, he uttered those prophetic words.


Dusk found me at his home, where he awaited with the rod and a reel spooled with a flyline. “I think you may like it, and nobody can appreciate it anyway, so I want it to go to a good home,” he said as he was taking it out of its green bag and putting it together. “Fish it.” “It might break, I dunno… It’s a Swiss Schreck 8 foot 1 inch.” “What….Who?” I thought. “Schreck? Geez, that means ‘Horror’ in German.”

He cast it effortlessly and handed it to me. “I think she is a 6/7,” he stated while sipping what he referred to as a Finnish Martini (Vodka and apple-juice). I picked up the rod and easily threw a tight loop of line 50 feet. I was surprised and shocked at how easy it was to cast a graceful loop with this rod. I pulled out more line and cast a tight 60 feet and the line cranked the reel at the end. “What the hell?” I stated out loud. “Did you tweak this rod?” “What the hell is this… What did…. How?” He was chuckling as we hurried to the safety of his den as it began drizzling. After a few glasses of his Spey-Side single malt that had more peat taste than bog-water, and long conversations on hand-made musky plugs, fly rods, angling, theory, art, aesthetics, literature and what-not, he bade me farewell to the Brule’ and I went on my way home with the windows open to hopefully dissipate the bog-smell from my person.

What was this rod?

It took awhile and a bit of searching before I could put together a provenance. Balestrieri had received the rod as part of some vague trade/acquisition involving a reel from some guy in Italy. The rod was made by a Swiss rod maker named Fritz Schreck, who, according to Rolf Baginski’s book on European bamboo, was a self-taught craftsman with quite a loyal following in Europe itself. He made rods under the ‘Kingfisher’ logo, and was noted for his taper design by trial and error, and for his eccentric way of using only the power-fibers of the cane, and assembling as many as 36 strips to make each section, instead of the common six strip method. Balestrieri had found some Swedish maple burl for a reel seat, and used it to compliment the odd but lustrous way each of the 36 pieces were flamed a different shade in the heat-treating process, making for long running lines of intricate blending of chocolates, coffees and caramels. He described the state of the rod to me as “A tomato-stake” when he got it. The reel seat and cork were past dereliction and some of the splices in the rod needed fixing.

Here was something new to me, and fascinating. A little-known rod-maker hardly seen or represented in America had crafted this fine instrument, and it had traveled from Italy to Balestrieri, who lovingly restored it, offered it for sale, and since nobody seemed to want it, sold it to me. It was back from the dead, complete with new rich brown silk wraps and a new bigger stripping guide, and destined to make music again on the water.

I placed it in my car in the morning, paired with a hangover and a Hardy Bougle’ mk IV 3 ½” reel. This was the “Use the good China” reel I had written about 7 years earlier after I found it in my reel bag nearly un-fished after I almost dinged it on a boat frame once. It was too valuable to fish… Then I was listening to a radio story where a woman was telling the tale of her mother’s good china which she had found preserved and safely put away after her passing, and decided to actually use it, unlike her mother. “Use the good China” became a symbolic phrase for sucking the marrow out of life, for using the good reel, and not collecting things to be used only once or twice on special occasions, but to brighten our every day lives with their use. So the Phoenix rod, back from the graveyard of an Italian closet buried under old shoes and the “Use the Good China” reel would be paired up. “Fitting,” I thought to myself as I arranged all the clutter of the trip in the trunk and back seat of the Volkswagen.

Part 2, the Phoenix fishing

On the Brule'

There would be no prettier place anywhere where I would go to baptize this new rod than ‘The river of presidents’. The lower Brule snakes its way through a canyon filled with a wild forest, grouse, and wolves. Their howling can accompany one through the woods on a late-exit from the river. On the drive up, I spotted a bull moose in a swampy field filled with cranberry bogs and springs feeding multiple river systems. A good omen, and a rare sight for Wisconsin.

I was alone on day one, for my friend was not to arrive until the following afternoon. I slept in the car that night, the cries of distant wolves haunting my sleep. The next morning broke bright and sunny, and I headed upriver to a smaller and narrower reach of the Brule’ and assembled the rod, geared up, and got on the water. Here I was, fishing the Schreck, and clearly completely out of my mind. There were somewhere in the river, steelhead pushing 30”, and I was using an 8’ 1” restored tomato stake and a reel with almost no drag at all. “Well, Carpe Diem damn it!” I thought aloud.

The rod performed flawlessly, especially with over-head casting. It threw without any difficulty a 7’ sink tip with a large green-butt skunk tied spey-style. It could perform spey-casts too, although it got tricky with a rod that short and a sink-tip and large fly. The rod and I got to know each other that day. I slowed down a bit in my casting, became smoother. I began to bond with the rod. I sat on a rock and looked at it in the bright sun. Not a gaudy rod, but rich with somber hues of memorable scotches and morning teas. A rod built for a purpose. Sea trout? Grayling? A workhorse. It did everything I asked of it within reason, like a fine shotgun that just mounts to your shoulder and swings like an old friend. Pick up the line.. backcast… put it down… and the rod was accurate as an arrow too!

Last year our little crew was visiting with two young fishermen from Minnesota late at night in the motel parking lot, when after enough lubrication for the tongue and 3 days fishless one of them solemnly brought forth the following phrase, “The Brule’ is beautiful, but she is a cruel woman.” This could sum up all my trips here for steelhead, where a swung fly, despite all the beautiful water, just has a hard time connecting with the fish, despite my long steelhead experience, or those of friends who she has enticed to her waters and dismissed with a turn of face and a wry smile. However, I would be guilty of sacrilege worthy of being tarred and feathered if I were to fish a nymph or pink plastic worm thrown with a bobber and split shot on that holy place, or with the new rod. We left after 3 days of hard fishing, knowing the river a good deal better, including why not to follow me when I think I find a deer trail, and having a wonderful time altogether…albeit fishless.

Part 3, Back on home waters…

Storms followed me back from the Brule’ the whole way, and by the time I was back at work, the skies were dark with rain, and the rivers coming up in flow. The first opportunity I got, I was in my local Lake Michigan tributary armed with the Schreck rod and a new sense of hope and expectation… and wind.

It blew. 30 mph gusts and sustained winds of 15 to 20 mph greeted me as I got my feet wet. Oh hooray. Perfect place for a bamboo rod. Up-stream winds too. I had to use a sling-around modified Belgian cast in order not to hook myself in the ear. I had to wade closer in order that my fly would not land upstream of me. Leaves littered the water. Every cast seemed to hook a leaf. If I dangled the fly in the water it collected leaves as the fall winds cleared oaks, maples, elms and willows of a color palette rich in frustration.

I took out of my old rusty Altoids tin a blue and black tube fly dressed in the wing and body to resemble an Atlantic Salmon fly. It was the choice not to resemble a leaf, and offer a big enough target in the optical-saturated water.

The rod performed beautifully given the horrible conditions. I still had to wade closer to the taking lies than I wanted, but found with a 25-30’ cast I had perfect control to steer the fly around in the bubble line and boulder bottom. I yearned to catch a fish, lake run brown or steelhead alike, either would be fine. I was like an anachronism out there in the river. Nobody does this... a bamboo rod and a big classic fly fished on the swing for big fish. I felt like I was summoning ghosts of the past as the winds whispered and wailed with imagined voices, and shadows raced across the water.

Then it happened… or something did. I had a tentative grab on the terminus or dangle of my swing. Instinctively I did nothing. Another little pull. It was definitely a fish, but since the river had king and coho salmon in it, I was afraid to set the hook, lest I foul hook a decaying salmon. Finally the loop of line pulled out from my rod hand, and the reel turned a few clicks. Aha! The ‘Aha’ turned out to be a small 19” steelhead. I set the hook, and was off to the races. The little male couldn’t really go too far in this water, so after a short battle and a screaming reel, my little Schreck rod bent and unbent and easily landed the fish, my heart beating a touch faster now.

What a hell of a rod. A true one of a kind, possibly the only one in North America… and I had baptized it ten minutes from my home.


The rest of that great day was spent in love with the rod, but frustrated with the fish, due to either the optical saturation of leaves in the water, the bright sun, or a combination of factors, I kept getting very tentative grabs like a steelhead coming for the fly, grabbing it, and then dropping it during the turn. I had six of these non-hook-ups in all, one which pulled out drag on the reel, and when I set the hook, found nothing but empty water. I just couldn’t seal the deal until evening, with dusk falling, I waited out the tentative grab again, and when I set against only a speculation of feeling, was hard into a steelhead which went upstream and airborne, causing the reel to sing an aria and the rod to take a deep bending bow to luck, to provenance, to history. “I have a rod for you…”

I stood looking at the fading sunset now painting the horizon a deep pink matching the sides of the steelhead I just released, and thought about the chain of events that found me here with a smile on my face, with a rod I never had heard of, and even if I had, never would have understood without casting it. A rod from Italy made in Switzerland by an eccentric genius reborn in loving hands and restored by my friend to bend again in the wind and on fish. What a journey.