Photos A Quiet Dinner

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I sometimes enjoy being alone, the robins working the back yard in the last light, my clothes wet from the river. Gladly and sadly thankful for my luck and worried with guilt about others working where I thought I would be. I know now not to dwell too long on the matter.

I would not sit at this table wet if I were not alone, but I am and I have my choice of dinner and entertainment. I choose fish, black beans and vegetables, cold barley soup, and a book.

The river, waist deep, is like a tranquil oasis of solitude and hum. Energy pours forth in its natural place, life infused inside working the circle of life. My target is smallmouth. On a ultra light combo they will fight you like a shark in larger waters and I let them, and then consider the mountain of hubris in defeating them only to return them to their home.

Where I was raised, the men that fired rifles also pursued all of the outdoor game. I am lucky to have been raised near water. The small streams and tributaries made for lots of trap lines, and it was a special event for a kid to stay up all night with their dad and a lantern, catfish lines pulling with a tug as a monster of the deep was coaxed in with chicken liver. My grandfather was on several of the islands in the Pacific, but I hope that some of his best memories were standing with me in the river. Mine are.

I have an old tattered book that I was given in 7th grade and I like to read it each year as the summer nights grow long. It is a great escape from the sometime 3 hours it takes me to drive 40 miles to my home. The entire book is an American classic, but it is the last paragraph that stays with me.

<span style="font-style: italic">"Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world's greatest flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs.

I am haunted by waters."</span>

-Norman Maclean

 

[shadow_sniper]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

why sir do you need 3 place mats to eat alone? just messing with you.

well written.

 

[Arch]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

There are actually 11, but my family is at Dollywood and I had to work.

 

[Switchblade]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

Now that looks to be a fine repast o' Brother of mine, and a simple pour of Guinness' best is ten times better than wine!
A solitary moment to reflect and enjoy, whilst one regales the past as a Boy

 

[Graham]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

There's no such thing as a quiet dinner.

 

[barnes12]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

"A River Runs Through it " is a great book. Good movie but a great book.

 

[AXEMAN]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

is it just me? i had to see if you were in the UK, there is just something brittish about that meal.

 

[Rollerpodger]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

great way to spend an evening

 

[vman]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

LOL Cold Barley soup ! Thats gold

 

[Spazz.]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

Sounds nice to me. I hope you enjoyed it.

 

[RollingThunder51]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

Nurse Coleman gave you a fork...Grats! Now that is real progress, soon....food you can eat with a fork AND knife.

 

[Maser]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

Okay, this pic creeps me out! Not only do you have the exact same fork that I use to feed my son's cat and the feral cats their canned food, but you also have the exact same place mats as I do.

 

[vietboy1st]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

0_o" is that fish ? ooh man i hate fish so bad which i had to give it to the neighbor's cats. unless if it was sushi i would eat it.

 

[9H_Cracka]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

What kind of rub did you use on the Robins?

 

[He Shoot Me]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

Purines; Alas, I miss them so......

-Pat

 

[SIERRAWHISKEY]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

Forty in Florida we call that size fish bait,do you need me to send you some nice flays of grouper or redfish..

ALTHOUGH I can see him still.
The freckled man who goes
To a grey place on a hill
In grey Connemara clothes
At dawn to cast his flies,
It's long since I began
To call up to the eyes
This wise and simple man.
All day I'd looked in the face
What I had hoped 'twould be
To write for my own race
And the reality;
The living men that I hate,
The dead man that I loved,
The craven man in his seat,
The insolent unreproved,
And no knave brought to book
Who has won a drunken cheer,
The witty man and his joke
Aimed at the commonest ear,
The clever man who cries
The catch-cries of the clown,
The beating down of the wise
And great Art beaten down.
Maybe a twelvemonth since
Suddenly I began,
In scorn of this audience,
Imagining a man,
And his sun-freckled face,
And grey Connemara cloth,
Climbing up to a place
Where stone is dark under froth,
And the down-turn of his wrist
When the flies drop in the stream;
A man who does not exist,
A man who is but a dream;
And cried, 'Before I am old
I shall have written him one
poem maybe as cold
And passionate as the dawn.'

William Butler Yeats

 

[Jon Lester]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

OK enough of the meal, We have been catching spring lizards(water dogs) all week and minnow traps are in the forecast Thursday, can't shut my eyes without seeing the kids, waist deep, in the New River. Live bait over artificial means a Fish fry Sooooo... Are they Bitin.

 

[Arch]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

SW. The Wild Swans at Coole. E.B. White.

Please see this site and cite, lest people think you wrote it.

I'd say more but the internet makes us dumb. If I post, that Mexican binky boy posts in my threads. If I post a tribute to a Marine, some groupie posts a facebook picture. It is part of the dumbing down. I have decided to fish.

<span style="font-style: italic"> Thus I, gone forth as spiders do
In spider's web a truth discerning,
Attach one silken thread to you
For my returning.</span>
-- E B White

JLester. Pretty good ERA going into the All Star break. That drive from Boston to S. VA must be wrecking your sleep pattern...

 

[Jon Lester]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

The most all star action I will be seeing is that the Daughter is playing in the Va High School All Star East/West game in Hampton on the morning of the 8th. Guess we will be traveling out your way

If I were to pitch, it may have an adverse effect on my casting action,so I had to decline Boston.

 

[icehouse]

Re: A Quiet Dinner

ok - usually i would say nothing and just smile, but this time i must say something. there is so much missing, but there is so much there. i get it, but dude. why worry about where you should/could be and remember god wanted you where you are now, for a reason.