Hold your hand lower on the handle. When you hold it up higher like that, you're choking it, and you won't have enough strength in your swing to drive the nail into the board.
He shows me and his hand covers most of the handle. He places the hammer back into my young hands, wraps my fingers around the bottom of the handle.
There, that's where your hand should be. Hold onto it and aim for the nail.
I move my whole arm back and take aim. He wisely moves his fingers out of the way. After making half-moon indents in the wood all around the nail, I twice manage to hit it squarely enough to drive it in.
That's great, Cat!
He takes the hammer from my hand and whacks the nail hard one time, making the nail head flush with the wood.
Ready to do it again?
All morning we nail boards to posts, we build our fence.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
When he's swimming towards you, you'll feel slack in the line. Reel in as fast as you can.
I have a fish more than double my weight on the end of the line. He jumps through the water's surface and briefly flies. The sight is so beautiful, so suddenly blue on blue on blue, I can't help but watch.
Pay attention to what you're doing. You have to let the line run when he swims out like that.
The sun and effort combine to bake me. He has a cloth he dips into the cooler, and wrings bone-chilling water over my shoulders. I've been at this for over an hour now. I'm tired. My interest is waning, but not the fight.
Do you want help?
No, sir.
He watches over me, strapped into the fighting chair. Rocking forward when the fish swims out, reeling back in when the fish tires. Rock. Reel. Breathe.
That's my girl.
It's another half hour before I land that fish close enough to the transom to be released back to the sea.
I'm exhausted.
He puts his great hand on my small shoulders. I'm proud of you. You did a great job, Cat, a great job.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Talk to me about letting go. I'll talk to you about holding on.
5 comments:
Chills running up my spine as I read this. What stuck out mostly was the part about the perfect storm, in a literal sense, and constructing a fence to ... I want to say maintain, but that doesn't seem to fit and neither does hold on.
You have to let the line run when he swims out like that.
Do you want help?
No, sir. (of course not)
He watches over me, strapped into the fighting chair. Rock. Reel. Breathe.
Spot on.
I have to be honest, when I read this, I was jealous. Jealous that you were so close to your father, but my family is so emotionally distant from each other. And, sometimes, I feel like I'm the only who feels anything out loud in my entire family.
Yes, there seems to be so much emphasis on "letting go" in our culture these days, but, sometimes, what we need to do is hold on. Hold on to those memories, those warm thoughts. Hold on to those good times, even while anticipating the good times to come.
Yeah, sometimes, holding on is just the thing.
Thank you for sharing this.
Great writing there. That was such a touching thing to write, truly beautiful.
Laugued about your OBL post as well. So true.
Scott
i think this is my first visit to your site. reading this post, i could see so much of my own dad in your words...
consider me an instant fan.
Great memories. Like network geek, I wish I had some of these and if, I think really hard, I suppose I do but they're not as beautiful by any means.
My first time here, but not my last.
:)
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