Ask me why I ice fish, and I’ll tell you it’s because I’m deranged and masochistic.
Ice fishing is definitely a poor choice for you. You would certainly not enjoy it, and it would be a grave mistake for you to try. You would hate pulling your sled out over the early winter lake and finding you had the whole water body to yourself. You would miss the summer lake cacophony of leaf blower, jet ski, outboard motor and house music.
You would regret being alone on the late afternoon lake, the hour of the pearl descending, the crenulated ice cast in pinkish relief as the clouds cracked to reveal the descending sun. You’d hate listening to the last of the winter geese calling out forlornly and hearing the frozen lake respond with a moan of its own.
It would be a travesty to sit on your bucket, back to the wind, gazing through your own private aperture into the stillness of another world. You would certainly rather be elsewhere when the crappie bite comes alive, when the speckled beauties open their paper lips and seem to leap from that other place and into your ungrateful arms.
You would hate to watch the edge of night rise above the wintry shore, and it would injure you grievously to be in audience for the first coyote canto.
You should skip the final act also, when you’re at home afterward, and the delicate crappie fillets are sunning themselves in hot oil on the stove, and you’ve uncorked a cold bottle of white, and you’re anticipating that first bite of fish, which, I assure you, will not be delicious.
I’m Chris Fink, and that’s my perspective.
