BOOKS JEREMY CORBETT
One of my favourite photos in the family collection is of my father sitting on a pebbled beach, resting on a piece of driftwood, fishing rod embedded amongst the stones. One of us boys, aged six or seven, is sitting between his legs, intently focused on a lesson in catching kai moana.
It’s from the early days of colour photography and looks faded-fantastic. I’ve decided it was me in that photo, but it could’ve been my older brother. I haven’t seen it for a while. Might not even be in colour, to be honest. And there might not be any driftwood.
I digress. The reason I am fond of that photo is the memory created that day – a father and son enjoying one of the important Kiwi cultural rites of passage, teaching your kids to fish. Making a memory. With the photo in mind, I decided, over the summer just passed, to do the same with my two girls.
Thus, one sunny morning, I declared Mum could take a break. I was taking the girls fishing. Complications arose fairly quickly. Apparently tides make a difference to the level of the water. Who knew?
I also had trouble locating rods, fishing line, hooks and bait. All apparently necessary. This memory was proving far from simple to construct.
Eventually, I found the gear I needed and threw it in the boot along with lifejackets, far too many snacks and the neighbour’s daughter who had decided to join us. We got to the jetty,
JEREMY FLOUNDERS WHILE ATTEMPTING TO TEACH HIS DAUGHTERS HOW TO FISH
got everyone’s life jackets on, then sat in the boot and ate all the snacks.
Eventually, we lugged our mass of gear to the jetty, where we found a great spot with visible fish swimming below. I smiled to myself, “Little do you know what awaits you, fish.”
It turns out someone was looking down on me thinking the same thing because events did not pan out the way I had planned. Two minutes after we got the lines down, the kids decided it would be far more valuable to spend our time leaping off the wharf like the others.
I hadn’t even had the chance to set up a photo. Out-voted, I traipsed armloads of fishing gear back to the car, where my swimming togs were not, then dutifully walked back along a crowded jetty in my underwear, three kids in tow.
I leapt off first so I could play catcher when they jumped. And jump they did. Nervously at first. Overcoming their fear to plunge into the warm water. Their lifejackets lifting them up, breaking through the white water. The fear instantly turned to huge grins and laughter. “Again! Again!”
We jumped and played for ages, paddled back to shore, tired and exhilarated, climbed into the car all wet, sat on our towels and spent the drive home reliving the amazing time we’d had “fishing”.
We never got a fish or a photo, but I think we may have just made a memory.