INCIDENT AT HORSHOE LAKE

I did not witness this brief amusing drama played out by only two actors. I will always be sorry I missed it. One party, the principal mover, was quite small, but the other, the receiver, was the exact opposite.

I know the exact place where it happened, having vacationed there for several consecutive years. It was at Horseshoe Lake, a few miles south of Richmond, Minnesota. The Sauk River, a small stream at that point, runs right through the lake. Much of the lake is very weedy and offers ideal habitat for sunfish, crappie, bass, northern pike and walleye. Jim Ruegemer, the owner-operator of Riverside Fishing Camp, was the eye-witness to the most interesting event of a rainy day.

For the convenience of himself and his patrons, Jim had constructed a small building near the edge of the lake. The side facing the lake was one large window, screened to keep out the deer flies and some of the mosquitoes. Here were tables and chairs where fishermen could get in out of the rain, or on other occasions play cards or checkers, but most likely to swap stories that had to do with fishing. It was named, appropriately, the Liar's Club. It has never been real clear to me why so many people have the idea that all fishermen are liars. Why, on one occasion, after we had made a very successful fishing trip to Northern Saskatchewan and had returned with abundant pictorial and piscatorial evidence, an acquaintance who was not a fisherman, on seeing pictures of Northern pike in excess of three feet (the pike, not the pictures), exclaimed, "The man that caught those fish is a liar!"

Now back to the story. It was a rainy day, not a hard rain, but the kind of day that is often good for fishing. The camp owner had constructed a long narrow dock that extended out from shore, through dense weeds to deeper water. On this day of intermittent light shower, Mr. Ruegemer was in his shoreline shop when he observed a little boy fishing from the far end of this dock. And he was catching fish. Jim said he didn't know the lad or where he came from. He would catch a fish, place his fishing rod or pole on the dock and bring his catch back to shore where he had located his stringer. Having strung his fish, he hurried back to repeat the process.

This had gone on for some time when Jim noticed that another person had pulled up in a car and sat watching the little fisherman. This woman, a stranger, was a person of very ample proportions. Whether the rain slacked up, or whether the success story playing out before her very eyes proved too much for her, we don't know. Rain or no rain, it was time to fish, and she knew right where there was good fishing. To fish or not to fish was not the question. The question was how to out maneuver the lad, for the fishing pier was so narrow. But necessity being the mother of invention, she struck upon a plan. In haste she took from the trunk of her car her fishing gear and a large sturdy bucket, about a five gallon plastic pail. Waiting until the lad came to the bank to string his latest catch, she crowded past him (actually she was a crowd by herself), advanced to the end of the dock, put down the bucket and sat on it. There was no room left for the former occupant. That point didn't bother her, but it concerned the lad a great lot. She had claimed squatters rights and assumed that her position established the "nine points of the law," for she had lots of squat. At once she began to catch fish. Upon each catch, she would half rise, not moving her feet, and toss her catch into the bucket.

The little fellow who had been evicted attempted to get past her. First on one side and then the other, but all to no avail. There just wasn't room, and her elbows fended him off. The observer in the Liar's Club could see and almost feel the tension building. Something had to give. He almost wished that the offender would fall in the lake! But he did not need to waste time or thought on that matter, for a plan of action was being formed in the young mind of the offended.

A number of sayings and adages, some old and some not yet coined could form a background for the occasion: The bigger they are the harder they fall, or thou shall not throw thy weight around, lest thou become unbalanced and fall, or The mighty shall not oppress the weak, or Who hath despised the day of small things? But none of these or their kind entered the lad's mind. His thought pattern was simple and personal: She has done me wrong, and I don't like it, and I will teach her a great lesson. In addition, I don't like her. He retreated to the shore, placed his fishing gear in a safe place and waited for the optimum moment. It was not long in coming. It came with her next catch. One moment she was perched there like Sitting Bull, The next moment she half rose to toss a hapless bluegill into her bucket, and the next moment it happened. The lad's timing was perfect! He had already begun his rush at the broad obstruction before him. He couldn't possibly miss. She was poised in the exact position for maximum propulsion. Striking her in the rear with all his force, he impelled her forward farther than can be imagined. When she came up with lake weeds around her head and shoulders, she seemed tremendously interested in improving her position. It is not know whether or not she had ever been baptized, but certainly never in such fashion. Certainly she would have preferred sprinkling to immersion. This unceremonious baptism did not seem to be a gladsome experience, nor one desired to be repeated or even witnessed.

Even if she did not know how to swim, it seemed like the thing to do now, and her bulk giving her some amount of buoyancy, she managed to grasp the bracing of the pier and clambered up to safety. As the saying goes, she did not stand on ceremony. Her adversary was nowhere to be seen and she did not look for him. No time was lost in gathering up such possessions as remained. As if all the fiends of the watery deep were after her, and having no desire to longer remain at the scene of such daunting and dampening experiences, she fairly ran to her car, fired up the motor and made a most rapid and inglorious departure down the road.

The little boy reappeared and resumed his fishing as though nothing unusual had ever happened. Of this I am sure, if you could have been near enough you would have heard him chuckle to himself now and then.

There's always a down-side to good stories. Same here. Only one observer and no one to get pictures!