Life With Steven: Shall I Go To Heaven Or A-Fishing?

Steven and Allen fishing

Shall I go to heaven or a-fishing?
- Henry David Thoreau

Steven went fishing on Saturday, courtesy of the Aim Marine Foundation, who sponsored Fish With A Kid Day at Lake Jennings in east San Diego County.

This is just like the boat we rode on

Professional bass fishermen brought their boats to the lake for the day and took kids from Children's Hospital San Diego Hematology-Oncology unit out on the lake to fish for bass. Steven and I went out with Allen and Bill in Allen's boat for two hours.

Steven loves fishing, and has been cursed with parents that really aren't fishermen. His mother is particularly bad at it and doesn't really aspire to become any better. I like to eat fish (seafood mostly), not catch them. I'm a wimp.

The last time they went fishing was in Memphis, it was the day that Steven would be admitted to the hospital for his last bone marrow transplant. I took Steven and Sean out to what was basically a glorified mud puddle next to the highway in Memphis called Catch 'Em Lake.

We rented poles and the woman advised me that the catfish were biting chicken livers, so I got some. Never, never, never again. I love my kids, dearly, but not that much.

Imagine yourself trying to make thick chocolate pudding stay on a fish hook and you'll get the idea. It was beyond gross, and when I finally would get a torn and bloody piece of chicken liver to stay on the hook, somehow, 75% of the time the chicken liver would fly off when we tried to cast. All we were doing was feeding the catfish, who I'm sure were chuckling to themselves down in the bottom of the pond about how stupid we humans were. Why on earth should they bite chicken livers on a hook when we were tossing livers into the lake, no strings attached?

The good news is we didn't catch any fish. I didn't really want to catch any because Steven would have wanted to keep them, and we would have had to lug them back to Target House (on the evening that he was going to be admitted to the hospital for a week for chemo) and someone would have had to clean them (after cleaning up after a chemo kid for 5 months, I draw the line at catfish).

This trip was a pleasure. They had an awesome boat, they knew what they were doing, they used lures (fake nightcrawlers) and not live bait, and I didn't have to do anything but chat and take pictures. My feet were dry. My arms weren't coated to the elbows with chicken blood and guts. I sat in a comfy leather seat. This kind of fishing is fun.

Steven with the only fish that made it into the boat

They caught three bass, but one broke the line and another one dislodged himself as they were trying to bring him into the boat. They told Steven he had to kiss the one that made it before he threw it back (something that he couldn't have done a year ago, fish germs and a compromised immune system and all that).

Steven and Bill