GIFT-LESS AND FISH-LESS ON CHRISTMAS EVE

Photo by Passy Crawford via Upslope.com.

By Alec Giacoletto, Bonfire Adviser

The flames in the wood stove flickered when Hammel stoked the fire with more logs. Cold winter nights were bearable only by the heat from the cast iron beast, yet no matter how many logs Hammel slung into its belly, the family never quite felt warm. Upstate New York winters wreaked havoc on its residents with bitter cold snaps of sub zero temperatures and heavy, wet lake-effect snow permeating from Lake Ontario to the west. Long, dark, Arctic-like winter days hung a sense of dread and seasonal grief upon the local populace, and for Hammel, a repairman by trade, this winter seemed particularly dark, for as of the week before, the local factory laid him off. It wasn’t his fault. The country’s economy of 1972 didn’t exactly provide prime conditions for a rags-to-riches Cinderella tale to unfold, but he couldn’t help but blame himself.

He looked under the Christmas tree, the one he cut the day after Thanksgiving, and longed for a simpler time. On the day he and his children brought it home, he had no perception of the current sunken feeling in his gut because the idea of losing his job seemed impossible. Hammel recalled the cheers and smiles of his kids when the last stroke of the saw’s blade punched through the final millimeter of bark, and the six-foot-tall idyllic Christmas pine tipped over. 

“Timber!” he jokingly shouted with hands cupped around his mouth. The annual tradition marked the beginning of his favorite season. He never made much, but he made just enough for his children to have gifts under the tree and treats in their stockings every Christmas, and seeing the joy in their faces after waking up that morning made the long hours in the factory worth every second. The toys weren’t terribly fancy, nor were they the hottest items in the catalogs, but that didn’t matter. Although his children were young, all 13 and younger, they knew it was the best he could afford, and that meant everything to them.

Yet this Christmas, Hammel felt ignominy. A feeling he let his family down persisted. Logically, the layoff had nothing to do with his job performance because half the factory workers lost their jobs, but it didn’t stop the immense shame he felt when he peered under the tree with no presents and the empty stockings at the base of the wood stove. Wrapped in a blanket, his oldest son laid passed out in the rocking chair as if there were no cares in the world, but for Hammel, there were too many to count, and he hoped that somehow he could shield his children from the wrath of the real world.

The next morning, Christmas Eve, his wife took the youngest children to the local church to help set up for the Christmas pageant that night, so Hammel was left with his oldest in the at-best lukewarm house. His son sat in the same rocking chair he fell asleep in the night before, but this time, he held a baseball magazine and sat wide awake. The two hadn’t spoken about the layoff, and Hammel felt ashamed to look his boy in the eye because he’d be forced to confront his failures as a father. In an effort to avoid confrontation, he told his son, “I’m not feeling too well. I’m gonna lie down and rest before the pageant tonight.” The two were set to meet Hammel’s wife and other children at 6:30 p.m. for the annual event.

“Uh, okay,” replied his son as he peered over the magazine.

Hammel awkwardly smiled, turned and walked away. Then, inspiration struck. I wonder if the boy would go ice fishing with me? Rod and reel tackle fishing was a favorite activity the two shared, but the idea of his son, who would receive no presents for Christmas this year, rejecting his offer presented a terrifying worst case scenario. If the rage his boy felt for him was so great that he rejected a fishing excursion, Hammel feared it may cause permanent damage to his psyche, so he stopped in the hall, paused for a moment, and continued to his room.

Snow flakes drifted down past the frosted window outside his bedroom, and in that moment he imagined future Christmases, ones where his son and he were set to drift further apart. A season once marked with joy and love would erode into formalities and distance. At that moment, Hammel knew he had to take the risk, so he quickly turned and briskly walked back into the living room, stood in front of his son and said, “Grab your things. We’re going ice fishing.”

Surprised, the boy fumbled his words, “Uh, uhm, right now?”

“Yep,” replied Hammel. “Grab your jacket and gloves.”

A sled full of short ice fishing rods, a ladle with a strainer, a tackle box, and two buckets slid from the shed as it crunched over the compact snow over ice from foot traffic. The two lifted the sled into the bed of the squarebody Ford pickup truck before jumping in the cab.

“Here, have some soup or hot chocolate,” recommended Hammel as he handed his son two thermoses full of the warm liquids. Then he handed him a metal lunch box, which was the one he used to take to work everyday. “It’s full of snacks and sandwiches. Eat up.”

“Are you okay, Pop?” asked the boy.

“I’m great, son. Just ready to go fishing.”

“Whatver you say.”

Of course, Hammel wasn’t okay. He failed his family, or so he believed. If he couldn’t provide gifts under the tree, he’d at least give him the best day of fishing he could provide, so they went to his favorite spot for lake trout and walleye.

A stoplight in the village of Sackets Harbor forced Hammel to observe the bustling streets of the small shoreside side town. Carolers chanted gleefully at the corner, and the jingling and jolliness of the town folk could almost be heard as the crowds of people completed last-second shopping for gifts and soon-to-be-had dinners – the best the now unemployed Hammel could do for his wife and kids was frozen whitetail deer meat for the millionth time. Maybe there were a few cans of green beans left, but there wasn’t a single grain of rice in the house and the next unemployment check wouldn’t come for two weeks. The wreaths on every lamp post and lights strung between buildings across every street suddenly looked gross. Before his anger could manifest further, the light turned green and he accelerated the truck down the road and off to the fishing spot.

Hammel and his oldest son trudged the ankle deep snow atop the ice. A narrow channel sat between a rocky island and the shore of the bay the two fished, and, due to their years fishing the region in all seasons, the pair knew it was deep enough for lake trout, a deep water predator, to inhabit, and this species (also known as mackinaw or lakers) became the favorite quarry of Hammel and the boy.

After placing tip-ups with cutbait in shallow water for walleye, the two drilled holes in deeper water for lakers. Hammel sat on his bucket, grabbed his four-foot open faced baitcasting rod with a jigging lure, dropped it down the hole until it hit the bottom, and flicked his wrist to initiate action on the artificial bait 60 feet below. His son, a skilled angler for his age, did the same.

Silence resided for over an hour, and then two. Hammel felt scared to initiate a conversation, for he feared it may result in his son scolding him for his irresponsibility and destruction of his childhood, and the boy didn’t seem to be in a talkative mood. He hoped the fishing would pick and ease the tension, but it didn’t. No tip-ups tipped up and no jigging action halted or paused from a strike. At least the snow let up. The sun remained hidden as a soft blanket of low-hanging gray clouds settled in the windless ice-scape. Somewhere to the west, the ice turned to open water because of the lake’s depth of over 800 feet. Folks called Lake Ontario and its siblings “lakes,” yet “inland seas” proved to be more accurate.

The now jobless repairman considered raising conversation with his son, but each time he tried the words were caught in the back of his throat, and he went back to staring menacingly at the ice hole as his rod jigged up and down. Similar to the decision to turn around and ask his son to ice fish earlier that day, he gathered the courage to address the family’s situation. Afterall, the boy would be a man soon.

“Son,” he said. “I need t-” his words ceased when the son’s rod bent straight toward the hole and his drag system screamed like the sound of an endless zipper.

“P-p-pop! I got one!” exclaimed the boy.

Hammel reeled up his line to avoid a tangle and ran over the hole to coach his son. “You got it! Keep ‘em tight! Don’t horse ‘em!”

The fight went on and the 13-year-old fought the evidently large fish with maturity and focus beyond his years. Each pump and reel up was met with ferocious pull and run down, but the son kept fighting and the dad kept coaching. Hammel smiled ear to ear just enough for his son to take notice. The two made eye contact and laughed. 

“Let’s reel this puppy up,” said Hammel. The boy nodded and continued the fight. Finally, after 15 minutes, the fish grew tired enough to give ground.

“Any moment now,” Hammel’s son said between upward pulls to a bent rod followed by reeling downward, “we should see him.” He began to pant as the fatigue of the endless fight wore on his body. Hammel leaned over to peer down the hole. “There!” he yelled and pointed. “There! Right down the hole! It’s a monster.” A laker from belly to back as tall as the diameter of the hole swayed below the ice.

“That’s a pig!" shouted the wide eyed boy. “That’s gotta be a 30 pounder!”

“Psh, it might be a 40 pounder, son,” replied Hammel. “Try to get his head in the hole. I’ll grab his gillplate and pull it up.” 

Hands plunged into the frigid water as he reached for the gill slit. As Hammel’s right middle finger grazed its slimy scales, the beast tossed its head, caught the line on the sharp edge of the hole, and sliced straight through it. The rod went straight, the line lost tension, and the two slowly turned and made eye contact with sunken faces of disbelief. Hammel’s heart sank. Not only was he jobless, not only did he ruin Christmas with no gifts, he now ruined a fishing trip with his son – the one sacred thing he had left, but just when his shame began to overwhelm him, his son’s frown turned upside down and his hands launched into the air with a cheer of excitement. “Woo-hoo! That was amazing, Pop!”

In disbelief, he responded, “But I-I lost your fish. I missed it.”

His son stared at him for a moment and paused, “Pop, you didn’t lose him. The line caught the edge of the hole. No one coulda stop it. I was lucky enough to fight and see a fish that big.”

“I almost grabbed him. I nearly had ‘em, son.”

Quicker than a snake on his prey, Hammel’s son embraced him. Caught off guard, he found his hands in the air, so he slowly dropped his palms and patted his back.

The giant lake trout lost at the hole turned out to be the only fish either hooked into that day, but a third party observer wouldn’t know it based on the laughs and lively conversations the father and son duo shared. While dragging the sled back to the truck, the boy turned to his dad and said, “I know you feel guilty about losing your job. I know you feel guilty that we can't afford Christmas gifts this year, but all I ever wanted was for my Pop to be okay.”

Hammel put his right hand on his son’s left shoulder and said, “You’ll never almost lose me again, and we’ll be okay. Now, let’s get to that pageant and tell our fish story.”

“Think anyone will believe us,” asked Hammel’s son.

“Maybe not,” he replied, “but those are the best fish stories.”

The two had better days fishing together down the road, and plenty of Chrismases with an abundance of gifts under the tree with full stockings over the fireplace; however, through the years, Hammel’s son adimately claimed that the Christmas Eve fishing trip of 1972 was his favorite. For as long as they shared the story, the two never wavered on their claims that the lake trout lost at the hole was giant, but they were the only two who would ever know for sure. In their eyes, that’s all that mattered.