The $55 fish

I'm in Alaska for the next two months. I arrived here last Sunday around 9 PM, which is to say mid-afternoon. The magic of axial tilt has gifted this latitude with summer days that max out around 22 hours during the solstice, or so I've been told. Right now, at the end of July, it doesn't get seriously dark until around 11:30. It's ridiculous and wonderful, like most everything here. Daytime highs are in the low 60s. There are deer bigger than horses. There are mountains bigger than everything else in the universe combined. And there are the most delicious creatures imaginable streaming through the town in numbers averaging around 60,000 per day.

The town is called Soldatna and it is now about one week past the peak of the annual sockeye salmon run. There are five principle types of salmon in Alaska, I have learned, and sockeyes are one. As you are probably aware, [most] salmon are born in freshwater streams, migrate to the ocean to go to college and get jobs, and, at the end of their lives, complete an unbelievable trek back to the very same freshwater streams of their birth in order to spawn and then die. As they approach the end of their lives, their bodies transform in shape and and turn a bright crimson -- thus, sockeyes are also called "reds" locally. I think it is worth stopping here for a second to imagine what it would be like if our reproductive cycle was like this. What if we went through the vast bulk of adulthood entirely unconcerned with sex, going about our daily lives as pleasant, androgynous drones -- until one day in our golden years a hormonal gear clicks and we suddenly sprout strong jawlines and voluptuous curves and expend every ounce of our bodies' energy in a frenzied orgy until we physically collapse and die? Not such a bad idea.

The Kenai River is packed with sockeye salmon as they race upstream to consummate their dirty sex fantasies, and this town is packed with RVs full of fishermen from around the state and the country in pursuit of them. My friend S., with whom I am living and who brought me up here in the first place, is a pretty damn accomplished angler. He's accumulated a freezer stuffed with huge salmon filets. Consequently, I have eaten salmon every day since arriving in Alaska. I ate it for eight straight meals until a bowl of oatmeal broke my stride this morning.

This is like magic to me. I love salmon. I love it. I love it in forms low (salmon patties with fried potatoes and a big puddle of ketchup) and I love it in forms high (sizzling steaks, shavings of smokey lox, sushi). I love it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. A sockeye is a big fish -- ten pounds isn't unusual -- and produces a lot of meat. And there are thousands upon thousands of these perfect meals there for the taking at all hours of the day. All you have to do is buy a fishing license. A one day license is $15, but I bought a seven-day license for $55 -- a bargain, I thought, considering all the salmon I was about to have at my disposal.

The catch is this: I can't catch anything. I cannot catch a goddamned fish to save my miserable fucking dilettante life.

It could be worse

I have caught exactly one salmon, on my third day of trying (for at least two hours each day)...and even it was beginning to turn red, meaning that the salmon is not too far from spawning and the meat is past its prime. Still edible, though: under my friend's patient tutelage, I clumsily filleted it and froze it for a future date when I decide I want to eat some fish past its prime. Considering we're drowning in luscious salmon steaks that are precisely in their prime -- literally dozens of fish, literally scores of pounds of filets, all caught by my friend -- I'm not sure that day will come. (This is a picture of mine.)

Let me describe the process by which one catches salmon, as it's different than any other fishing I've participated in. First, waders are donned (usually) and the participant trundles into the rushing water of the river. A hook, unbaited, is cast out into the current, and a weight attached to the line sinks it to the bottom. The participant then drags this diabolical apparatus along the rocky bottom, not by reeling in but by turning his or her body and rod as the current sweeps the hook and weight downstream. An arc is thus traced upon the river bottom as the hook bumps its way along, after which the cast is repeated. The hope is that a salmon's upstream trajectory will intersect with the arc at the exact moment the hook is bumbling past, causing it to lodge in the fish's perpetually agape mouth. The salmon is reeled in, netted (often with someone else's help), and clubbed to death on shore.

If it seems absurd to you that this shot-in-the-dark method could ever, ever succeed, I agree. It's a big river and it's moving very fast. Standing at one point in the water and dragging along a one-inch hook seems a lot like grocery shopping by wandering blindfolded through town with one of those long-arm grabber claws, repeatedly snapping it open and shut in the hopes that you stick it through the right window and snag a box of macaroni and cheese. But work it does. I've seen it firsthand -- a lot. All access points to the river are crowded with fishermen (they're over 90% men, I'd say) standing as close to shoulder to shoulder as their rod lengths will allow, casting and casting and casting and scoring and scoring and scoring.

Assholes.

What a sight, folks. What an idyllic scene. There's the Kenai River, its churning, sparkling turquoise frigid even in July, its unfathomable bulk whipping past at breakneck speeds. There's the rich green of the solemn trees -- spruce and alder and birch -- and shimmering strings of Alaska wildflowers dotting the long river grasses in assorted blues and purples. There's the brilliant sun bathing everything with warmth. There are the fishermen, hip deep in the water, their lines dancing, their voices lifted in triumph and congratulation when the water breaks to reveal a huge sockeye salmon leaping from the water and tethered by the mouth to a bending pole belonging to one of their own. There's a childlike wannabe clunking around in waders that can't keep the water from soaking his crotch, tangling himself up in discarded fishing line, spurting out flaccid casts into a narrow window of river (casts which end up snagging plenty of twigs, more used line, and decaying salmon carcasses) all the while glumly eyeing the success of the other anglers -- the real anglers -- and nursing a secret malice deep in his troll-like heart, not unlike Satan. Oh, hey, that's me!

(I should stop the self-pity for a second to remember that the salmon deserve more pity than my own whimpering ego. I am not anti-fishing by any means, but you've got to admit it's at least a little cruel to rip a creature out of its journey towards its life's fulfillment by spearing it in the mouth and then bludgeoning it to death in its last moments of pain and terror. But I'm not even gonna pretend that's why I haven't caught any fish; If I could, I'd be spearing and bludgeoning with the cruelest of them.)

In addition to my $55 fishing license that has earned me exactly one moderately sub-par fish, I have also sank most of my free time this past week into this futile activity. I have tried, folks, I really have. I don't know what I'm doing wrong or what everyone else is doing right, but since my license expires tomorrow (and my patience expired yesterday at around 9 PM after another empty trip) I think I'm giving up for now. Oh well. Really, it is only fair and just that I'm failing, because I've had a lifetime of opportunities to become better at fishing and I've mostly ignored them. Arkansas is filled with delicious fish, and although I've been fishing for catfish, bass, or crappie with my brother many times since childhood, until very recently I've gone fishing mostly to spend time with him rather than because I wanted to learn how to fish. As I said, salmon fishing is much different than other fishing, but many of the principles remain the same: how to cast accurately, how to set a hook, etc. I have neglected to train myself and now that I really want to catch a fish, I'm clueless. And why haven't I learned how to fish well? Because I get bored when I go fishing, mostly. I love the scene: river or lake, quiet and calm, friends or relations, possibly beer. But I want to talk, or listen to music, or maybe read a book. I want to go somewhere else and do something fun. I want to drink the beer more rapidly. I want to have a sandwich. I want to go swimming, but it's not allowed and anyway ewwwww gross it smells like fish.  Maybe we could play some board games or something? Fuck.

Does anyone want a $55 salmon? Come to Alaska and we'll eat it together.