Requiem for Bernard Rodrick Ciceri

Six years since my Dad died. I miss him. One of my friends asked me today what is my favorite memory of him, bless her. "Salmon fishing,"I said. When we had our cabin on Galiano Island he would ask each of us girls, in my memory always only one at a time, if we wanted to go fishing with him in the morning. Of course, as an adult I understand that taking a 6 year old out in a 16 foot motorboat for 3 or 4 hours, one really can only safely handle one at a time. I also know for true that there were plenty of times when my sisters were there with us, but in the very earliest days, this is what I remember.

At the dawn tide, whether 4:30 or 6 or 8 a.m. he would try and shake you awake. If he could wake you, sleepy bear, up you got in your little footie jammies, blue flannel with white lambs whose eyes were closed and little clouds of zzzzs clustered round their heads. Dressed warm you didn’t really wake up until the cold outside air hit your face and the smell of salt and creosote hit your nose. Standing on the dock, finally fully alert your head dips back and your eyes, and mouth and mind fill with the blue-deep green -shimmer and pink-blush of the dawn. If he couldn’t wake you up enough to speak a “Yes, Daddy, I want to go fishing.” Then he would leave us all to sleep. Likely because if he’d tried to wake one of my sisters as replacement, later there would be tears of jealously.

I’d have my coloring books or comic books, or later, my Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys novel. The lines would go out and we would just fish. Sometimes he read the newspaper, sometimes his bible. Sometimes we even played Go Fish or Cribbage. But mostly we didn’t talk much. Didn’t need to. We fished. I watched the sun on the water, the trees slowly drifting bye, the other boats and the bob and pull of the lines; focused for hours on the rhythm of the nodding head, watching for the sudden tension that signaled the strike of a 15 lb Coho. The lines zing still in my memory. Dad springing to action, grabbing up the rod and reel, a true knight leaping to battle in his fishing cap caparisoned with hooks and lures and his Cowichan Indian knit sweater, smelling of cigarettes and Old Spice and salt. Sometimes he’d call for me to help him, either wield the net or hold on to the rod with him. Laughing and scared all at once, his arms round me, his big hands over my small ones on the rod jumping and vibrating the reel spinning out with a bright hard whirring. Warning me to watch my fingers. Him guessing by the run and play and fight what kind of fish was on the line and how big it would be when we fought it to exhaustion.

Sometimes a rare moment when the line would snap, and the fish win both the day and a sharp shocked oath from Daddy’s lips, quickly bitten back. Not one for swearing or violent displays of temper my Dad. His own anger was always short-lived and seemed to embarrass him. He thought displays of anger were unseemly and not worthy of a gentleman. He'd get annoyed too when a pack of Orcas would appear, not mad really, we'd just pull the lines in and watch the whales hunt. I'd chew through my peanut butter and banana sandwich and he'd sip the last of his thermos of coffee and light a cigarette.

But mostly, there were fish. Always. I have no memory of day without fish. There were the grilse, as kids our favorites, the young salmon that he would hold up to his chipped and slimy ruler, asking me to read the number out loud as he explained to me the rules about size and the number we could take “Our Limit” he called it. Never, ever in my recall did we take more than Our Limit. Daddy believed in rules. He thought that rules would keep us safe. Maybe sometimes they do.

Those grilse were so delicate and smooth that they were breakfast food in our house, fried and buttered and sprinkled with salt and lots of black pepper. Then the Sockeye, the Red Spring, and the Coho, their scales shimmering like crystals flashing rainbows. The slick slime on their skin fresh from the deep. The texture of which those of you who claim your fish from the fish monger will never know and a slick sticky sensation the like of which I have never found a thing to compare. In the net and over the side and the kick and fight and the sharp quick smack with the heavy stick that in my Dad’s skilled hands quieted them so quickly. Then the sinister and frightening miniature sharks he named Dog Fish that would curl up his lip in disgust and cause me to shrink back into the farthest nook of our little red and white ski boat, with the Mercury out-board engine. Round-eyed and silent I watched as he pried the hook from their tough and gaping mouths with a pair of pliers always at hand. Just the thing for managing fish hooks, a good pair of pliers. Then returned to the deep, or sacrificed to a massive swing of his hard wood stick thru a huge and violent arc – hard to kill those little demons, but bait for the crab trap if he couldn’t free the hook without fatal damage. Then the Rock Cod and Black Cod big and small that came lethargic and docile to meet their fate. Ugly as all get out, but always received with joy because it meant my Mum’s own version of fish and chips for lunch.

Home then and sleepy proud, struggling to bear my share of the bounty up the steep incline of the gangway and onto the picnic table on the cabin’s deck. No time to rest or change or eat, the fish must be cleaned immediately and Mum and my sisters would appear with pans and towels and old newspapers and spoons and sharp knives. Even from very, very young our little fingers on knives learning to scrape scales and gut fish, first with the guidance of Mum and Dad’s hands doing all the real work, then lightly resting on ours as we gained skill and finally only hovering nearby. We would look at the roe or testes and Dad would pronounce it a boy fish or a girl fish before the guts were yanked free, and with our teaspoons scrape the blood from the spine, a rinse in a bucket of seawater and onto a cookie sheet before Mum whisked all away to fridge or sent two of us to the marina for a block of ice for the cooler if the catch was plentiful. After the guts were wrapped in newspaper and the tools rinsed and dried, Daddy would let out a big sigh and settle into a deck chair. I would bring him coffee or beer depending on the angle of the sun. As we waited for Mum to call us for lunch, I would lean against the arm of his chair and receive one of those absent minded one-armed hugs, a quick peck on my cheek and a thank-you for going fishing with him.

Daddy, you are welcome, it really was my pleasure.