Do you ever go back and remember some of the great stories of your life by trying to repeat them? Many, many years ago (YES, WE WERE YOUNG THEN, WE KNOW THAT!), my husband and I used to do some fishing. About four years ago I told him, “I want to go ‘catchin'” (I’m not as patient as I once was, and really just want that fish, small or large, on the end of my pole, cane or some newfangled titanium carbon hybrid (yes, I made that up:)). We were at the beach with our family, and he kindly arranged an inshore fishing trip for us. Sadly, a hurricane off the coast encroached. I insisted, “But, it’s sunny outside — we can still go, can’t we?” (I’m not always reasonable when I have something in my mind I want to do. See, this is what I meant yesterday when I said it’s amazing he has patiently put up with me for 28 years!). He was firm, and then they evacuated the boats anyway, so I let it go. (Hmmm, you think maybe he was right?) Two weeks later, I blew out my right shoulder in a tennis tournament and gone were all dreams of going ‘catchin” for the next two years. (I REALLY blew it out and it took two surgeries and long rehabs to get it right.)
This morning, I received an email from my husband. He wanted to know if I would like to do some inshore fishing this weekend when we celebrate our anniversary. He had the courtesy to ask because right now my “good” shoulder is struggling a little bit, and he wanted to make sure I felt like it. My response: BOY DO I! And I remember, for one of our early anniversaries, we went to Destin for the very first time, and went deep-sea fishing with about 100 other people. I don’t even know if I caught anything. But it was a blast.
This time we’ll be aware of the oil that lurks in the Gulf. This time, neither one of my shoulders will work as well as they did 28 years ago. If I catch anything, I may have to let my husband help me pull it in (another sign of redemption of my determined independence!). But I don’t care. We’ll be fishing. And there’s not a hurricane anywhere near us right now.
