Best Catch of the Day

Howdy, Neighbor. People have been telling Phil he’s a good storyteller for a long time… so we are trying something new and pretty-much non-sales Just sharing occasional sweet stories, tall tales, and life lessons learned around these parts. Northwoods Notes are a new, semi-bi-irregular peek into the heart and mind of Phil Frasier… you can read or listen… whichever you prefer… and you are receiving a copy because you’re a current customer of Frasier’s Plumbing and Heating, Inc. We think you’ll like them, but you can unsubscribe any time by clicking on the link at the bottom. But we hope you give us a chance!

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I have six sisters. Two younger and four older.

Two of those sisters recently paid a visit when Joanna and I were in Florida.

Katherine lives in Atlanta and Mary lives in Chippewa Falls. I hadn’t seen Mary in five years.

We all went out on a boat off the Charlette Harbor.

We spent the day catching sea trout a snook. Katherine even hooked into a jack crevalle that peeled the line and took her all around and under the boat.

We caught a lot of fish, but the stories we shared were the best catch of the day.

Growing up in a family of nine, you have some crazy stuff to talk about.

Like when my sisters used to call me Flipper.

The nickname was actually coined by my aunt. She’d call me “Flipper Dipper.” My other sister caught on and, before long, everyone was calling me Flipper.

Some boys from the North side of town would pay me anywhere from 15 to 25 cents to fight the big kids in the neighborhood.

Those older kids would beat me up and make me cry, but I’d keep coming back for more. They made me mad, so I wanted to fight them again.

The kids I was fighting were three to five years older than me. My mom and sisters would watch from the window and say, “Oh, he’s gonna get pounded.”

Of course, I got the last laugh, because those fifteen cents bought me some red wigglers or nightcrawlers for fishing.

We reminisced about sneaking back into the house when we were out doing things teenagers shouldn’t be doing.

I’d try to get in through the basement door when it was really late. But the house was always locked up tight. So, it was a choice of either staying somewhere else or facing the music.

My sisters, on the other hand, were a little smarter. They’d pay each other five dollars to go unlock the basement door after my dad fell asleep.

When I’d come in late, I’d usually go to the kitchen and make myself a late-night snack. My sister Katherine used to wake up and sneak down to the kitchen to see what kind of culinary concoction I would create. She said I’d put all kinds of weird ingredients together to make a sandwich.

One time, I made a sandwich with anything I could find. Huge slices of onion and braunschweiger along with every kind of fruit, vegetable, jelly, and just about anything else in the in the pantry. I told Katherine I’d give her a dollar if she’d eat it. She ate the whole thing.

Those were good days.

Y’know, when you’re a kid, growing up seems like it takes forever. But it’s just a tiny blip in your life.

When you’re young, you never said you were four or seven years old. You’d say, “I’m four-and-a-half” or “I’m seven-and-a-half.” You looked forward getting older and celebrating the other half.

Grade school drags into Junior High which creeps into High school.

It’s not until your twenties that time starts speeding up. Then, somewhere in your thirties or forties, time takes a different turn. It starts accelerating and, suddenly, months seem like days and years feel like months.

They say time flies. But I didn’t expect it to feel like a supersonic jet.

We’ve all been through a lot in our lives. Time isn’t getting any slower. So taking a break to slow down, share stories, and relive memories with friends and family… well, it’s just good for the soul. No social media. No texting. I’m talkin’ face-to-face conversation.

There’s nothing quite like it.

Thanks to my sisters for reminding me of that.

Take care, Neighbor. Take good care.

Phil Frasier.

PS – I never paid Katherine that dollar. With compounding interest, I wonder what it would be worth today.