I come from a fairly large family. It's not Catholic-large, but still decent sized. On my dad's side, I've got six cousins, and on my mom's side, four. Then there are multiple second cousins, aunts, uncles, and so on. And there's Katie, my sister.
Out of all the grandchildren on both sides of my family, I am the only one who loves to camp and fish. And oddly enough, all four of my grandparents used to camp and fish together when we were kids. Sure, we would have "family" camping trips where all of my cousins on whichever side would go, normally against their will. But as much as my grandparents loved to go camping and fishing, I was the sole grandchild to inherit that gene.
So when my grandparents from my mom's side would pull their camper to the river and meet my grandparents from my dad's side with their camper, I was the only kid that ended up tagging along. And it was one of the best times of my life.
We started going when I just a baby, and I guess the first real memory that I have of it is when I was four or so. I suppose four is about the earliest age most anyone can recall having memories of anything. Anyway, the campers were pulled up side by side to each other, creating kind of a common area between them. There were clothes lines, propane stoves on picnic tables, coolers of Vess soda, and my Grandpa Warnecke's "hand cleaning station". This was a detergent bottle filled with water that hung upside down from a tree. Hanging next to it was a pantyhose stocking with a bar of soap in it. So you would open the bottle slightly so a little dribble of water would come out. Then wash your hands with the accompanying pantyhose soap, and wallah! Clean hands!
There were actually only two rivers that we would go camping at. You see, in Missouri we have what you call Trout Parks. They are State Parks and there are four in the state: Bennett Springs, Meremac Springs, Montauk, and Roaring River. They aren't urban ponds or man made rivers. They are beautiful, natural spring fed rivers surrounded by some amazing scenery, and complemented by nice campgrounds and stocked trout. For whatever reasons, my grandfolks preferred the latter two parks. And so did I. There were miles of river, filled with freshly stocked rainbow trout. It was a safe and easy place for me as a young'n to walk or ride my bike throughout the park. We would always see deer, raccoons, and every so often black bears would visit our camp. And it was a fantastic place to learn how to catch a fish.
To me, it was a utopia.
I would sleep in a storage loft above the fold-out table in whichever camper I felt like that particular evening. I would usually switch it up every other night, just to keep things fair. On a typical day of camping, my grandparents would wake up at 5ish in the morn, wake me up and make me eat coffee cake before we went to the river. This was by far my least favorite part of camping. Yes, I was excited to wake up to go fishing, but I hated coffee cake. But they made me eat it so I wouldn't get hungry on the river and start bitching. After choking down said breakfast, we would load up in the 1978 Pontiac Bonneville and drive from the campground to the river. Now, at Trout Parks you cannot fish until the park ranger blows an incredibly loud siren, or "whistle" as we called it. It was similar to a tornado siren. I remember getting so excited when the clock approached 6am. I would click the release button on my close faced Johnson fishing reel and get in my casting stance ready to heave. And as soon as we heard that "disaster horn", one thousand lines would go flying and one thousand lures would hit the water's surface simultaneously.
Usually, a trout was caught within the first three or four casts, and it would immediately go on the stringer. With any luck, four more trout would accessorize the stringer during the course of the day. If it was a really good day, you had to start releasing fish until the day started coming to an end, and then catch your last keeper at the very last minute to give you your daily limit of five trout. If you didn't have your five keepers by the time the "panic horn" blew, you were shit out of luck. Regardless of how many were caught and kept throughout the day by our camp, there was always a fine feast after fishing was over. With any luck though, it was fried fish and taters with a Vess Grape Soda, RC Cola, or Orange Whistle to wash it down with. To top the night off, there was usually a friendly, competitive game of Yatzee.
Twenty-five to thirty years later, my Grandpa Warnecke and Grandpa Todd have since passed on. And earlier this year I lost my Grandma Todd. She was 90 years old.
My Granny though, at 94, she keeps on trucking. And whether she knows it or not, she is an enormous part of why I'm who I am today. Yes, all of my grandparents took me camping and helped teach me how to fish, and I love each one of them dearly. Granny though, she spent a little more time and had a little more patience with me. She was usually the one that I would gravitate towards when we all went down to the river. When I would screw up a cast and get a rat's nest in my line, she would sit down on a park bench, untangle it, and give me her rod to fish with. And as soon as she was done untangling my line, I would get a rat's nest in her line. Whenever that happened, she would always call me a "turd bird"...which is a nice way of calling your six year old grandson a little shit.
As the rest of my grandparents grew "old" in their old age and traded in the camper for a walker, my Granny kept on running circles around everyone. And since she remained incredibly spry (and ornery) for her age, I was able to continue fishing with her more so than the rest of my grandparents.
Since the beginning of the Trout Park days, I have "graduated" to fly fishing, thanks to my dad. I now live in Colorado and am on the river most every day that I have off. But I still know where my love for the river started, and my grandparents had a ton to do with it...especially Granny.
I'm 35 now, and she's 94. I'm flying into St. Louis next month, and I'm going to take her to the Trout Park. I talked to her today and she's really looking forward to it...probably no more than I am, though. Hopefully we'll catch ten trout between the two of us, and fry them up with some taters.
If she does the cooking, I'll buy the Vess.
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