Thursday dawns with a hazy sky, hundreds of wildfires burn in the Canadian north.  Since we all share a single planet New York City, the eastern seaboard of the United States is choked with unhealthy levels of smoke.  For New York’s citizens it is unhealthy to be outside.  Are we about to change our fossil-fueled lifestyle on this warming planet?  Not a chance.  Our way of life is “normal.”  Normal is a mere linguistic convention for what is customary, what we are used to, what we’d rather not think about.  That’s all.

There’s more on my mind but first this tune by Whitesnake seems apropos: Here I Go Again.  This song’s a metaphor for our condition here in America.  Drifters walking along, recapping in an endless loop our habits, surrounded by luxury by comparison to the rest of the world, etc. etc.  A lonely street of dreams indeed…  To be clear, I do like the song.

Yesterday I made up my mind go go fishing.  I like to fish, not necessarily to catch anything.  The activity is meditative; alone with one’s thoughts and nature, facing the pond’s surface which is a habitat for frogs and turtles, with baited hook one waits quietly, eying the neon orange bobber floating in the distance.  Oh, there’s the occasional deep bass thrumming of a bullfrog.  And the call of red wing blackbirds.

The Don Early Park in West Chicago has a pond that’s the right size for fishing.  I spent two hours there, fishing my way around the bank.  I was not the only one interested in fish, as you can see from this photo of the white heron on the distant far edge of the water.  I caught three or four catfish which I returned to the water.  A small catfish can put up quite a fight as they are strong fish.  I do my best to gently remove the hook, hoping for luck, that the fish is uninjured.  I know it’s just a fish, but I still feel empathy.  Fish, and every other living thing in nature are similar to us.  Life is always a struggle.  That is a given.  Struggle within the constraints of one’s environment for nourishment, for suitable habitat is the way-of-life for all living things.

I knew that pulling catfish from the pond has a hazard.  Removing a fish hook from the bony mouth of a fish means exposure to the sharp spines on the sides of a catfish.  The odds were good that sooner or later I would be stabbed in the palm by a struggling fish.  I payed my dues.  A small amount of blood trickled down my palm.  A fair retribution when I think about it.  I violently removed the fish from it’s home.

Everyone knows the look of blood.  No need to post the picture.

Every action has consequences…

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