Wednesday, January 16th 2008

It was my tenth birthday, my first double digit celebration at our summer weekend destination on Catawba Island on Lake Erie. We spent every weekend there and most of our vacations and I hated it. I hated having to pack and then drive two hours, on a good day, to the island. My father had a boat and being the avid fisher family, we spent a lot of time on the water fishing, swimming and just hanging out.

A typical weekend started Friday night arriving pretty tired from the drive and going to bed early. We were awakened really early much to our discomfort and dragged to breakfast. I usually had two eggs sunny side up and two pieces of whole wheat toast with no butter. Then came the hard part, we would drive to the boat and then ma would get the dope ready, Dramamine. She would crush up the bitter white pill in a spoon with “Slice”, a citrus 7-Up concoction that my brother and I grew to despise forever with or without the pill. We were pretty good at being on the water after being drugged and either slept or played games. As we got older we took the rods and began to fish.

There aren’t many fish tales in my background, but I remember winning a Fish Ohio award for a White Bass that I caught with my dad and Uncle Kenny. The fish was 15.5 inches long from tip to tail and the award was for any fish longer than 15”. That fish stayed in our freezer for years to come uneaten and completely whole tucked beneath countless Ziplock baggies of sauce and meatballs.

When it was time to reel ‘em in and head home my brother and I would tear up the remaining sandwiches into small pieces and feed the seagulls that followed us all the way in to the dock. It was there that the carnage began. My father and whoever accompanied us, my Uncle Kenny or Randy, would begin to clean the fish in a precise, professional and bloody way. Meanwhile, ma and usually us kids would go down the street to the local farmers’ stand and get sweet corn on the cob, peaches and tomatoes for the upcoming dinner. Dad would bread the filets and deep fry them to a perfect golden brown. The corn was shucked by me and the sibling. I remember I always took great pride in husking the corn and making sure that every single thread of silk was taken off and the corn’s speckled kernel skin was left shiny and smooth.

We all gathered around the wooden picnic table waiting for the day’s catch to be presented. Soon there was plates of fresh fish fillets with corn on the cob that hours before was still on the stalk. Ma would prepare a salad of fresh tomato wedges, red onion and fresh basil all dressed with extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper. I remember this meal so well I can almost taste it and chances are before I blew out the candles on that zucchini cake, that’s what we had for dinner. My Uncles had places on either side of us and became quite close to us and our parents. We spent a great deal of time with them on and off the island. Their wives and kids soon became our “adopted” cousins and Aunts. On that particular dinner, for my 10th birthday, they were there to help cut, bread, serve and celebrate.

I would give anything to have that back. All that bitching and moaning I did when I was a kid was all because I did not want to go to my family’s weekend getaway on the lake. You really have no idea of what you have until you grow up and find that you dearly miss what is long gone.

This entry was posted by Johnny on Wednesday, January 16th, 2008 at 2:32 PM and is filed under Ancient History, Anthropology, It's All Relative, Photos. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

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