My Introduction To Light Tackle

Greetings Angler,

I have been fishing since I was a small child. The first time I went fishing was in a small lake that seemed to be THE center of activity in Kissena Park, Flushing - New York. While visiting family friends my brother Anthony & myself had the privlege of tagging along to the lake with our family friend Jesse. My brother nor I had any clue what fish or fishing was other than the gold fish game at the local street fair. Jesse had his own stick with holes attached to it & this weird looking thing protruding off it with sting on it. It was about 4 or 5' long, somewhat clear in color & had the coolest looking multi-functional, gear turning, handle swinging futuristic gadget looking, I don't know WHAT it was I was looking at, but I wanted one. All the way to the park I looked at & studied the rod swinging back and forth in his hand in synch with his stride. I couldn't help but notice this really dark brown shrivled up thing swinging from the end of the line.

I finally mustered up the courage to ask him about this swinging menace that was coming close to & away from my nose and was hypnotizing me. "What's that?" I said, pointing to the dark mass. "Oh that's bait" he replied. "What's bait?" I quickly asked. Then he went on to explain about the fish in the lake LOVING these big fat juicy worms and how the one that was on the hook was from yesterday, old & needed to be changed. "Where do you get new worms from?" I asked. "Oh, that's the fun part" he said with a big wide eyed smile. It sounded like we were about to have some fun and boy oh boy after that long walk, was I ever ready to enjoy myself. As we walked down Kissena Blvd, the beautiful trees of the park came into view & the smell of the grass, flowers & trees in the air was so pleasant and captivating. I had a feeling it was going to be a great day.

When we arrived at the street where the park began Jesse told Anthony & I that we were going to have to lift stuff up & look under whatever we pick up because that's where the worms were hiding. "What kind of stuff?" I mumbled. He said "You know, rocks & logs". Wow I thought, this is going to be fun. So I quickly found my first rock to look under. As I hunched over & grasped it I could feel the morning's dew on the rock & surrounding grass. The rock was about 30" across & partly burried in the dirt. I wiggled my little fingers under a crack in it & started to pull. I could hear the seal between the rock and earth break free with a weird suction sound.
As I peered at the contents of the indentation in the ground I got my first look at wild life. I was very excited!

There were small bugs scurrying into the thicket of grass like a raid from some monsterous being. I yelled "HEY THERE'S A WORM OVER HERE". My brother & Jesse came over quickly. "Wow, said Jess, THAT'S a BIG one" He then grabbed it & pulled it from underneath the rock & I got my first look at a wriggling, twisting wet looking thing called 'Bait'. I ran to the next rock and pickeds that one up, nothing, then the next. " I FOUND ANOTHER ONE" I screamed. Jesse said "Ok Mikey, pick it up". 'WHOA' I thought to myself, I never touched a worm before.' "I FOUND ONE TOO" Anthony yelled. Geesh, I was very aprehensive about capturing a real live worm so I held the rock up with one hand & reached down to grab it with my pointer & thumb fingers.

As soon as I touched it the worm moved & squirmed,.. "AHH" I yelled while dropping the rock & jumping up & down wiping my fingers on my pants! I was so scared when that thing twitched, plus it it was cold, wet and had a slime that stuck to my finger. Ewww, that was my first experience with wildlife and it freaked me out. Jesse picked up the huge rock with litte effort, captured the wriggling worm & stuck it in the paper bag with the first worm we had caught.

Anthony came over with his worm between his fingers & Jesse commended him for capturing his own worm. Anthony had a big smile on his face & was teasing me. I thought to myself that I just had to capture a worm before the day was over. Jesse said "Follow me". We stayed in single file behind him all the way through this thin dirt path surrounded on both sides by these long plant stalks that had these big bugs hovering around them. I asked " What are those Jess?" He said " those are pussy willows". "Wow, the huge winged bugs must really love them, they're all over" I happily shouted. Just as I finished saying that I could see a glimpse of the lake in the opening in the distance. The water was such a nice colored blue, calm & teeming with small splashes & boils at the surface. I was immediately hooked.

Hookin Aint Easy sold me 2 beautiful shirts for my nieces today.

To be continued...... Check out my other blog http://penfishingrods.blogspot.com