I was working on the current book today (which I suspect will go down like the proverbial lead brick with the publishing establishment. Oh well. Sometimes we just do these things) and working on the scene where the city-reared kid spears his first flounder out in the dark water with his grandmother.
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Josh did, and his grandmother worked the fish over the prongs with her knife. “Yer first fish. You done good, young man,” she said.
She’d always called him ‘boy’ before. “That was just like… amazing!” He meant the way it had stayed still, and that really odd feeling he’d had when the spear struck home. He was still shaking from it.
And for once his grandmother seemed to understand without him trying to explain. She put a hand on his shoulder.“It’s in yer blood, Josh. My people have always done this. Always and always. This is our place. This is what we do, this is what we are. Without it, we’re leaves in the wind. I’m glad yer here to carry it on.” Then she shook herself, and said gruffly. “Well, don’t just stand there. Get on with it. We need another one for our tea.”
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For those of you who don't understand this... we walk in two separate worlds. You are welcome to yours. Leave me in mine, where food is not something from a supermarket.
There's a TV show here in the States called "Duck Dynasty". Basically it's about the family of the man who invented a revolutionary duck call about 25 years ago. Became hugely successful. To understand you have to know the patriarch was the starting quarterdeck at Louisiana State in front of Terry Bradshaw (one the NFL's best quarterbacks ever)and walked away from it all to live back in the bayou.
ReplyDeleteNow his family has a multimillion dollar business. His sons still want to try and live as "rednecks" and his grandchildren are now what he calls "yuppies". His one son, Jase, once said "I don't like meat from the store...it scares me." The scene you wrote is similar to several times the patriarch takes his oldest grandson's out hunting or fishing. It rings true.
Particularly to someone who grew up learning to fish and hunt from his grandmother at the mouth of the James River in Virginia.