The first cast used to be mine.
So did the front seat of the boat.
My fishing trips for basically the first half of my life were all about how many fish I could catch — and believe me, when I wasn’t using some kind of actual clicker, I kept a running tally in my head.
But many things come with maturity.
You develop patience.
You become aware of others’ feelings.
You discover the thrill of generosity.
So, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that during the calendar year 2022 my biggest thrills have come from watching other people put fish in the boat.
It started in January when I took my dad Mike Brasher and my uncle Harold Brasher on a guided crappie fishing trip in northern Mississippi. Only one of us could fish at a time, so they went first and second and I gladly settled for third.
They both had personal bests in the boat before I wet a line.
Would those big fish have belonged to me if I had started ahead of them? Considering we were targeting specific fish in open water, there’s a good chance.
But I couldn’t care less. Once those two fish were in the boat, as far as I was concerned, we could have gone in for the day.
I’m not bragging about this new attitude, mind you. If anything, I’m a little ashamed I was a few months shy of my 49th birthday before I discovered it.
I’ve spent a lot of time helping people catch more fish through the years. But I don’t ever remember receiving the true joy I did this year from just being the helpful deckhand.
I don’t often remember positioning the boat so someone who doesn’t get to go much could cast straight down a log, catching bass after bass, without even trying to make a cast in the same spot.
I don’t recall spending more time teaching someone to skip docks for bass than I did fishing when they were really biting.
I don’t think I’ve ever anchored on a bream bed, baited hook after hook and made cast after cast without reeling at least one in myself.
If you’re in my situation — by most lifespan projections, a little past middle-aged — and you haven’t discovered these thrills yet, you should convince yourself during this season of giving that you’re late to one of the greatest parties you’ll ever experience.
If you’re younger than I am and you’ve been partying that way for years, my hat’s off to you.
I think I was late because I lacked the three things I mentioned previously — patience, awareness and generosity. I wasn’t mean-spirited; I just grew up believing you catch every one you can catch every time you go.
I blame part of that on tournaments.
We get so caught up in the spirit of competition sometimes that we train ourselves to believe we’re working every time we’re on the water.
We’re not.
We’re also not judged by pounds and ounces as often as we think.
There are other metrics — and when we’re not due to weigh in at a certain time, they’re much more important than the total weight of our best five.
My daughter, Ainsley, was diagnosed with autism when she was 2 years old and didn’t catch her first fish until this year. It was a bluegill that mesmerized her for several minutes after we got it into the boat.
I made the cast, helped her reel hand over hand and lifted the fish in front of her, making sure she didn’t touch any part of it that would draw blood.
Then we did it all over again.
That’s patience.
Once she went from looking mesmerized to looking bored, I took her for yet another boat ride down the lake.
That’s awareness.
During an office outing in October, I helped a group of ladies catch crappie from a nearby private lake.
I always think of myself as the best crappie angler in the boat, regardless of the boat. But other than the one I caught to locate the fish, I never reeled one in.
I just played deckhand, watching them as they watched floats sink, caught little speckled fish and smiled.
I don’t know what was the bigger surprise — that they had so much fun catching 10-inch crappie or that I had more fun than all of them put together.
That’s generosity — and if you don’t have it, gift it to yourself this season.