Author Mark Munger (Cloquet River Press)

In the end, half of us  (the Midwest and the coasts) voted for a man who raised himself up from his bootstraps, became the first African American editor of the Harvard Law Review, launched the greatest political campaign of our lifetimes, and served admirably (without scandal or serious misstep) for four years as our president. The other half of our nation (most of the West and nearly all of the South) voted for a man who was raised in privilege, served his business interests, his family, and his church with distinction, and served one term as the governor of a state that didn’t even vote for him in the presidential race. To say that we are a divided nation is an understatement. To say that we face challenges is to minimize the schism in our neighborhoods, cities, states, and country. Still, I think some basic truths from the past eighteen months of rancor should not be ignored.

First, Americans have now rejected a political philosophy based upon theological arguments: one which chooses to ignore dinosaurs, evolution, climate change, medicine, science, and commonly understood human biology. As an example, in Minnesota, a state of great teachers, great public and private universities and colleges, and thoughtful (for the most part) politicians, voters soundly rejected amendments to the Minnesota Constitution which sought to define marriage based upon theological principles and which would have turned the right to vote into something akin to cashing a check.

However you feel about same sex marriage, the failure of the recent amendment regarding that issue deserved its fate: Minnesota law (statutes passed by our elected representatives) already define marriage as the union of one man, one women. Defeating the amendment did nothing to change that legal definition.

With respect to the Voter ID proposal, I was puzzled by the debates surrounding the issue. Lost in the passion displayed by both sides was this fundamental truth: Voting is a right, not a privilege. Putting on my lawyer’s hat for a moment, my argument against the amendment is very simple: Every man or woman living in Minnesota has the right to cast his or her vote unless someone can establish that the person attempting to vote is unqualified to do so. Period. Voting is not akin to obtaining a hunting license, a license to drive, or seeking public benefits. Those are all privileges that may or may not be accessed by Minnesotans upon showing suitable qualifications. Casting a vote; a basic, fundamental right of any adult Minnesotan who has not had his civil rights taken from him due to a felony conviction or a finding of incompetency by a court of law; should not require anything more than the voter’s attestation that the voter is who he says he is and that he lives in the precinct where he is casting his vote. Think about this: any felon released from prison can attain a license to drive. A photo ID (driver’s license) doesn’t establish that a felon has had his civil rights (including the right to vote) restored. Presenting a photo ID at the polls in no way “prevents” the voter fraud that is claimed to be at the root of the proposed amendment.

I also think that what Minnesota, what America affirmed last night is this: We celebrate and hold nearly sacred stories of Americans of modest means who have followed their dreams and made something of their lives. President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama are sterling examples of such hard-earned success. Despite the birther and other crazed voices to the contrary, they have done nothing to diminish the level of their accomplishments in either their private or public lives.

Finally, what Minnesota and America also affirmed last night is that personal integrity: being true to one’s moral and ethical compass; can defeat, in the end, distortion and deliberate falsehood. Contrast President Obama’s obvious personal integrity with Mitt Romney’s response to the racially coded (or not so coded) venom injected into the campaign by Trump, Gingrich, Limbaugh, and a host of others on the Right. Not once during a very strained and heated campaign did the president point to Gov. Romney’s faith as being out of the mainstream or an impediment for the Governor to be president. No surrogate of the president went there either. But on the other side of the equation, Governor Romney was remarkably silent. He did nothing to challenge or rein in the nonsense being spewed by his crowd. Nothing.

John McCain, when confronted with right wing commentary about candidate Obama’s race, religion, and place of birth in 2008 stood far taller. He said loudly and clearly: “Knock it off.” He showed that, even in a losing effort, ethics and integrity matter. Unfortunately, Mitt Romney never displayed similar fortitude.

The way I see it, the legacy of this election is not so much a story of the division of our beloved nation based upon red and blue states. It is more a reminder to us all that personal integrity matters even when the flames of politics are hot and the race for high office is razor close.

It was heartening to see America vindicate our president, his wife, and their family as being indeed, not just one of us, but the best of us.

Peace.

Mark

Duluth Heights Community Club

The crowd was meager from the get go and didn’t change much over the course of time. Seven hours. Six books sold. Not a very productive way to spend a Saturday. I know. Even J.K. Rowling may have had a day, somewhere long ago in her past, where she sat by herself at a book store or a public signing event. Maybe. I know many other nationally known writers, including Jane Hamilton (Map of the World) and Jacquelyn Mitchard (Deep End of the Ocean) have written about such occasions despite their literary success and having large publishing houses behind their work. Still, I am, by nature, an optimistic man and when the Duluth Heights Hockey Association emailed me a notice that they had room for an author at their first ever fundraising carnival and craft show, I looked at the calendar, saw an open date, and jumped at the chance to try to hawk some books.

My Table at Duluth Heights

I was pushing my recovery from shoulder surgery to be lugging around boxes of Laman’s River, Mr. Environment, Suomalaiset, and my novel-in-progress (Sukulaiset, of which I have a few extra review copies I sell at such events) but I figured it was the opening day of Minnesota’s firearms deer hunting season and there would be women (the half of American society that buys and reads fiction) out for a day of shopping and diversion while their menfolk stalked whitetail. I was wrong. Oh, there were indeed a few women about, lugging infants or with toddlers in tow, who came for the carnival in the basement of the community center. And a few of them lingered upstairs to look at the wares of the various vendors. But on this glorious late autumn day, with slight rain giving way to sunshine and balmy temperatures, I saw very few ladies digging for cash in their purses at my booth or any other booth at the event.

My ever diligent wife showed up with lunch for me sometime after tedium turned to boredom. My old man called about a personal problem while I was occupied with selling a book to a young man who had served on a jury a few months back in my courtroom. I had to brush Dad off so I could make the sale, which I did. I returned Dad’s call, gave him the best advice I could, and chatted with Rene’ for a time as I munched on a McDonald’s wrap. Rene’ said adieu and then it was just me and the empty space of the hall, or so it seemed to my now less-than-optimistic eye.

Don’t get me wrong. The exposure was likely a good thing despite the lack of sales. I managed to chat with a few folks who, though they didn’t buy a book directly from me, were interested in the Nook or Kindle version of Laman’s River. And I did other work while I sat in my chair, my left arm immobilized in a sling, Lortab coursing through my veins. I managed to select the textbooks for my environmental law course at UWS next semester. And I finished reading the most recent issue of Poets and Writers Magazine. So, despite the scarcity of sales and the infrequency of patrons, the day was productive.

Mark with His Magazine

Dad wandered in near closing time. We talked a bit and then he waved his hand and went home to watch talking heads on MSNBC. I sold another book: Then it was time to leave. One of the vendors, a nice older woman (who had bought a copy of Sukulaiset) offered her four wheeled dolly and the services of her husband to help me load out. The kindness of strangers, the charitable intent of the show (and the friendliness of the folks who put on it on) might tempt me to come back in spite of disappointing sales. I have a year to think about it.

Peace.

Mark

The Hall Near Closing Time

Matt and Chris Munger with Lexie

OK. So the photo doesn’t exactly show how flat the terrain outside Ashley, ND is.  It shows a hill: A big mother of a hill that we climbed last week in search of pheasants. For the 6th year in a row, my sons Matt and Chris and I have joined my old man, Harry, in a rental house in downtown diminutive Ashley (population 882 but I think the census folks counted the cats too!) to hunt pheasants, the occasional sharptail grouse, and ducks. Normally, the boys and I stick to upland birds and leave the ducks to Grandpa (he’s 85 today!) and his 80 year old buddy, Bruce. But this year, there was no Bruce. Only grandpa, me, the two boys, and Lexie, my son Matt’s affectionate and hardworking red Labrador.

Matt and Chris and the Big Slough

Generations

We’re as dedicated in the field as my kid’s dog. We’re just not very good shots. Oh, we had our moments this year, don’t get me wrong. There were a couple of double roosters, where Chris and I, or Matt and Chris, hit the big beautiful male birds as they took to the sky. There was at least one triple: Chris hit two pheasants and I hit one from the same flurry but we lost my bird when poor Lexie couldn’t make up her mind which of the three downed, but still running birds, to track. In the end, for our four days of hunting, we downed nearly twenty roosters, saw some impressive corn fed deer, watched flight after flight after flight of geese and ducks and swans and cranes fly over head, and only argued a time or two. Grandpa managed a few flurries into the field. even bagging a sharpie and a rooster in the bargain. But we all knew, in the undercurrent  of irritability that surfaced from time to time when trivial things got Grandpa’s goat, that he really wanted, more than anything on Planet Earth, to be a young man tromping through the cattails with his hunting buddies. Problem is, he’s not a young man and, truth be told, other than Bruce, who missed the trip due to an upcoming medical procedure, there aren’t any hunting buddies left to take the field.

Still, and this came through as we downed good beer and shots of Jamison during the 3rd presidential debate after another hard day on the Great Plains, I knew how much Dad enjoyed being with us. Despite his gruff demeanor (and even gruffier beard!), an aura of love emanated from the Old Man even when he was yelling at the President to stand up to the man Dad calls “the empty suit”.

You can tell how happy Grandpa was to be along for the trip (a trip that he organized for years: a duty Matt has now assumed) from the photograph of Harry and Lexie on the couch after a long day in the field. See, Grandpa came out a few days early with Lexie to “scout” out the terrain, to get the lay of the land, and learn the local hunting scuttlebutt. His last Labrador, Cleo, died a few years back: The best damn hunting dog he ever owned. There’s a point in life as a bird hunter when you realize you’ve had your last dog. To Harry’s credit, when Cleo passed, he recognized she was the end of an era. But Matt and his wife Lisa are generous with Lexie. The dog often spends respite time at Grandpa’s house for no other reason than because she’s loved. So, while Harry may be dogless, he is not without a dog. Anyway, Lexie and Harry spent a few days bonding in North Dakota before we arrived. Their connection is clearly shown below.

Lexie and Harry

No man knows his own destiny, nor the time of his passing, nor the true impact of his life upon others. Walking the windy fields, the dry marshes, and the rolling hills of southern North Dakota last week called these truths to mind. No father is perfect. Lord knows, I’ve tried to be there for my four sons and likely succeeded in some ways, failed in others. So has my father. But one thing is certain: Dad passed on a love for this earth, for the thrill of the hunt, and a reverence for wildlife to not only me, his eldest son, but also to his grandsons. How many hunts remain for any of us? Who can say.

Matt, Chris, Lexie, and Harry (and a few pheasants for good measure!)

Mark, Lexie and a pair of roosters

Happy 85th Birthday, Dad!

Looking north, towards the Cloquet River

Discernible snow on October 11th? I can’t remember, in my nearly 58 years of kicking about NE Minnesota, when there’s been appreciable snow on the ground this early. But, photos don’t lie and there you are! I’ll leave it to the scientists and science haters on the House Committee on Science and Technology (isn’t it funny that we have a bunch of guys and gals from one side of the aisle on that committee who disavow the age of the Earth, dinosaurs, mastodons, and yet, supposedly serve the interests of science?) to debate why it’s snowing in NE Minnesota when the leaves haven’t even fallen off the trees. I’m not smart enough to guess the cause. But it happened.

Looking east.

Looking west.

Maybe, as they say on “Garage Logic” global warming is all a bunch of mysterian hooey, which is a polite way of saying it’s bull shit. (Or, if you’re a Joe Biden fan, malarkey.) Or maybe, just maybe, there’s something to the whole notion that we are doing something weird to our atmosphere and hence, our climate. None of us, of course, will likely live long enough to know who’s right and who’s wrong in this debate but it sure is a curious thing to wake up a few days after stream trout season has closed to see a blanket of white across the fields.

Whatever it’s source, the pristine covering was, to this old downhill and cross country skier, a welcome reminder that sometimes, we actually get real, non-man-made snow, in our “neck of the woods”. I’m hoping for a big snow year, whatever the cause, so that once I heal from my upcoming shoulder surgery, I can take to the woods and the hills and enjoy our winter.

Really.

Mark

Park Point Community Center

Saturday. My son Jack and his U15 soccer team is starting playoffs and I’m going to miss the game. Not just as a parent but as one of the coaches. Before I agreed to coach the team with Tim and Gary, I’d signed up to be at the Park Point Community Center for the “Get to the Point” craft show, selling my books. The fact that I’m going to miss the first game (it’s at 9:00am-right when I’ll be setting up my book display) but make the second game at 3:00pm by closing down my sales efforts an hour early sits in my stomach like bad beef.

Choices.

I’ve coached all four of my sons in soccer and, on occasion, two of the four in hockey. I’ve been a confirmation instructor at our church for all four boys. I’m currently active in Jack’s scout troop. I try to be a good example, to be there when our sons need their dad. But, from time to time, my desire, my drive to succeed as an author gets in the way of parenting. There’s only so much time in the week, only so many days to be shared. Today is one of those days when I have to be in two places at once.

My wife Rene’ calls me as I am setting up in the cozy space of the Community Center. It’s her job, since I’m pursuing John Grisham-like recognition, to drive Jack in to his game.

“The car won’t start.”

It’s the second time this week her Matrix won’t start. Last time, she left the dome light on. This time, the starter clicks but nothing more happens.

“Did you leave the light on again?”

My wife isn’t happy with my suggestion. She informs me that she’s perfectly capable of diagnosing a car problem and that the present defect is not, repeat, is not due to her, but a mechanical malfunction.

“Why do you always have to place blame on someone?” she asks.

Because I’m a judge. It’s what I do.

I hold my tongue. Eventually, our eldest son, Matt, his wife and infant son arrive and give Rene’ and Jack a ride to the game. Our faithful mechanic Woody is on his way to diagnose the issue: It’s a good thing he lives just up the road.

I settle into my chair, ready for customers, and try to keep up-to-date on the soccer game through technology. I don’t text often but I find myself receiving and sending texts to Matt as he watches the game. The second text I get is disturbing.

Jack’s hurt.

I try to get more information. Matt ignores my texts. Customers stop by. I sell a few copies of my work. I have a few manuscript copies of my novel-in-progress, Sukulaiset: The Kindred, the sequel to my best selling historical novel, Suomalaiset, for sale. The rest of the copies are in the hands of my pre-readers. Once I get their feedback, I’ll make my final edits and then send the book off to a professional editing service. From there, if all goes well, the book will see print sometime next summer. A professor from UMD stops by and we talk about the book. I sell her a copy. She promises to email me with her thoughts and criticisms.

Matt finally updates me. Jack is out of the game with a pulled hamstring. I try calling Matt, Rene’, and even Jack, who has his own iPhone (though it’s unlikely he has it on the sidelines). Nothing. I feel depression, a sense of failure at not being there for my son, weigh heavy.

Reminds of when I was in Winnipeg, being pummeled with questions by that crazy ass book reviewer at Chapters (the Canadian equivalent of Barnes and Noble), who it turns out was the only reviewer to pan Suomalaiset. Chris was playing in the All Star game back home while I tried to gain recognition as an author. I missed that game too. And for what? So some ass could pillory me? Sometimes I don’t know why the hell I’m doing this.

Despite the fact that its drizzling and cold outside, I decide to take a walk to see what Lake Superior is doing. I follow a wooden boardwalk set in sand to an

observation platform overlooking the big water. I find relief and peace in feeling the familiar embrace of October wind and mist. I’d like to pack up my books and find a bar to drown my lament but realize that getting tanked won’t erase my melancholy. In truth, my soul craves melancholy. It’s in my DNA to persevere against angst and downheartedness and guilt. So I turn on my heels and head back to the craft show.

1-0.

That’s the text Matt sent me while I was contemplating the lake.

Who won?

Telling me the score, without putting it into perspective, really doesn’t help much. And it doesn’t tell me where the game is at in terms of time.

Is the game over? Is that a final score?

I don’t text these questions but they linger in my mind. Matt doesn’t text back. I finally call and find out that Jack’s team won. I put my phone away and have a nice chat with a young woman and her husband manning the booth next to mine. He’s a scientist with the Wisconsin DNR: She’s a “reformed” attorney, practicing her art and no longer appearing in court. Because she’s from out east, I describe our court system for her and she describes her work as a prosecutor and former Assistant AG. I glance at the clock. It’s 2:00 and the crowd is dwindling. Time to go.

I make it to the second game in time to help coach a group of fine young men. Despite his injury, Jack is determined to play. It takes him the better part of an hour to stretch out his hamstring to the point he can run at all. I yield to his petitions and, against my better judgment as a coach, I put him in. It’s clear from his limited speed that he’s still hurting. But he tries, as do his teammates, to win their second game of the playoffs. Despite hammering away at the Grand Rapids net for most of the game, the last fifteen minutes of the contest is all Rapids. We hang on and the game ends in a tie. There’s a question as to whether Jack’s team will advance further in the playoffs. My son and I head home, boxes of books stacked to the ceiling and a soccer ball rolling around in the cargo area of the Pacifica.

Peace.

Mark

Indian Lake

My wife was insistent. She was determined that we were going to take a road trip to view the colors. Complicating her Saturday desire was our 15 year old son. Jack was supposed to go with his church youth group on a paintball expedition, which meant that we had to drive him to and from town. But when Jack wandered home from a sleep over at a friend’s house, Jack did what teens often do: He changed his mind. Instead of firing balls of paint at other Lutheran kids, he chose to stay home.

“This is where Chris and I launched the canoes,” I said to Rene’ as we stood on the dock at the public landing on Indian Lake, the oranges and golds and greens of early autumn surrounding the crisp blue waters of the small ox bow off the Cloquet River.

My reference was to a trip my third son Chris and I made a decade ago. We put in our canoe at Indian Lake and paddled downstream, towards home, over the course of three nights and days. It was a great trip.

“Very pretty,” Rene’ said, looking out over the tiny teardrop of water. “Very pretty.”

Rene’ at Indian Lake

After a quick pit stop at Hugo’s in Brimson, a local watering hole noted for its friendly atmosphere and constantly revolving ownership, I put the Pacifica in gear and headed east, towards Highway 2. The maples flamed. The birches and aspen waved golden fingers in the breeze. The tamaracks hinted color. And the white pines, the sentinels of the North Woods, stood green against the painted backdrop.

Highway 1 proved arduous. Minnesota’s fifth season, road construction season, was in full swing. Fifteen miles of detour took us to Babbitt, a mining town on the far eastern edge of the Vermilion Range, where we caught County 21 and headed north, towards our ultimate destination, Ely, Minnesota.

“There’s the sign for the resort,” I observed as the car rumbled over pavement.

I was directing my wife’s attention to a large sign that read: Timber Wolf Lodge.

“Susanne says that they’ve really cleaned up the place,” Rene’ replied, referencing my beloved aunt, my mom’s only sibling. Susanne and my mom grew up working the resort on Bear Island Lake built by my grandfather Jack and my grandmother Marie. Grandpa hired the strong backs and clever hands of Finnish carpenters to build the cabins, store, ice house, and other structures of the fish camp. That all of the original buildings still stand says something about the abilities of immigrant craftsmen.

The Pacifica slowed as we approached the Chocolate Moose in downtown Ely. I found a parking spot and we clambered from car to sidewalk, intent upon lunch. I had the BLT. Rene’ had a salad and a bacon and cheese Quesadilla. We ate our fill and paid the tab before going next door to Piragis to shop. Predictably, Rene’ found clothing and I bought a book. The same pattern was repeated at Mealy’s across the street. I kept eyeballing a new CD by Eliza Gilkyson as my wife studied beautiful Arts and Crafts furniture. I finally broke and bought the music.

“I couldn’t resist,” I told Rene’ as we headed towards the car.

“I can see that,” was my wife’s only comeback.

“They had five copies of Laman’s River at the bookstore,” I added as my wife left me on the street corner to search for a restroom, pointing to the Piragis sign above her head.

“Nice. Did you send an announcement?”

“Yup. But they must have bought them from my distributor,” I replied as Rene’ headed into the store. “They didn’t order from me.”

I like to visit bookstores whenever we’re out and about to see if they are stocking my books. The bookstore at Piragis didn’t disappoint me. They had copies of my latest book as well as my best selling historical novel, Suomalaiset, on their shelves.

Waiting for Rene’, I called our friends, Ron and Nancy McVean who were staying in their motor home at Bear Head State Park a few miles down the road. I reached Nancy and confirmed we’d be stopping by for a visit. Our plan was to have a brief chat and then have dinner in town before heading home. Didn’t work out quite that way.

Ron McVean, Bear Head Lake

Ron and I took a long walk around the bucolic and peaceful state campgrounds. We skirted the lakeshore and ended up standing on a fishing pier, doing what old friends do: shooting the breeze. Nancy and Ron were camping with the Kuntzs, the Chesneys, and Greg Kaneski, each family in its own motor home or trailer, making a last-of-the-season camping trip to Bear Head, a trip they’ve been making as a group for nearly a decade.

“You guys want to stay for supper?” Nancy asked when Ron and I finally wandered back. “Pork chops on the grill.”

I looked at Rene’. She looked at me.

“Sure.”

Nancy got on her cell phone and caught Greg Kaneski coming out of Mass at the Catholic church in downtown Ely.

“Mark and Rene’ are staying for dinner,” she told her longtime boss and friend. “I need you to pick up two more pork chops.”

Bear Head Lake

There ensued, shortly after Nancy got off the phone, an intense discussion between Ron and me about the proper methods of campfire building. Ron is a sort of “pile it all on guy”, believing that leaving too much space between dry logs invites sputtering inefficiency. I, being an Eagle Scout, like a smartly stacked, evenly spaced column of dry wood which allows air to foster combustion.

“You’ve got too much open space, too much air between the logs,” Ron critiqued as I built the campfire pyre in the steel fire pit. “It’ll never burn.”

I ignored Ron.

“Never gonna burn.”

Someone, I think Nancy, noted that there was a wisp of smoke rising from the fire pit. I hadn’t put match to birch bark so there shouldn’t have been any heat or smoke coming from my masterpiece.

“Must be hot coals left over, ” I noted, getting down on my hands and knees to blow.

“Never gonna start that way,” Ron advised, producing a blowtorch, his weapon of choice for starting gas grills, campfires, or anything else needing a helping hand.

Much like the proverbial little engine, I huffed and I puffed. I placed a slender piece of bark on the glowing coal and blew and blew but I couldn’t create flame. Picking up a handful of dry maple leaves (we’ve had no rain for weeks and the forest is as dry as a bone), I touched an edge of the red leaf to a glowing coal. A  fragile flame appeared. I blew to encourage heat.

“You’re getting ashes all over yourself,” Rene’ advised.

“And all over my picnic table,” Nancy noted.

On the verge of vindication, Ron added a piece of dry birch bark to the flame.

“I suppose you’re gonna claim you helped start this fire,” I said as I stood up.

“You’ve got an uneven flame,” Ron noted, touching his blow torch to pieces of bark strategically placed under the pyre. Soon, the entire stack of wood was crackling.

“You’re gonna claim ownership after I knelt on the dirt and blew and blew and blew, aren’t you?”

Ron made no reply.

We ate a fine meal and talked until after dark while the fire danced. Stars came out and our fifteen year old son called and wondered where his parents were.

The fire Mark made!

Peace.

Mark

Wolf Lake

Friday. I’m off work because, well, because I need a vacation. I’ve got plenty of vacation days left over from last year and darn it, I’m gonna use them! My intention is to motor on up to one of my favorite North Shore trout streams and do a little brook trout fishing. Brookies are my favorite fish to catch and to eat. Better than walleye or crappie or salmon. You can disagree with that culinary assessment if you like. It’s a free country. Anyway, I took the day off to spend some time on a quiet north country stream. Just me, my fly rod, a few dozen nightcrawlers, flowing black water, and the closeness of the forest.

I’ve made this admission before. I, like the drunk would-be actor in A River Runs Through It, am a worm dunker, not a fly fisherman. I grew up plying the little streams of Hermantown and Duluth with a hand-me-down Heddon fly rod, a carton of hand picked worms, and a pair of distressed hips waders. My dad, though he had a collection of artificial flies in his tackle collection, never used them for anything other than decoration. Oh, he fished virtually every stream on the North Shore for brookies and steelhead (migrating rainbow trout), and threw lures at big German browns in Wisconsin’s beloved Brule. But use flies? I never saw him try his luck with one. So here I am, on the cusp of 60, and still fly impaired. It’s a deficit in character, I’ll grant you. But one I’m willing to live with.

“Jimber caught a nice bunch of brookies from a little creek up by Brimson,” my dad said a year or so ago.

Dad took Pauline, his significant other (and my Godmother) on a tour of the Brimson area and claimed to have located the stream. He gave me the name and the approximate location. Now, this “no-name” creek isn’t marked by the Minnesota DNR as a designated trout stream on its maps, which, if I was at all smart, should tell me something. But as I pack the Pacifica with my rod, four dozen night crawlers, my tackle, and some extra shoes (my waders seem to have gone missing, likely in the possession of son No. 3 who has a tendency to “borrow” sporting equipment), I think: What the hell. Maybe I should give the “no-name” creek a go. It is, as you’ll learn, an unfortunate decision.

After driving past Wolf Lake and other local landmarks of the Brimson area, I park the car by the side of the stream in the middle of nowhere. The land is not the steep and undulating terrain of the North Shore, where the short runs of the rivers and streams plummet from elevation to Lake Superior. No, the landscape I’m in is as flat as piss on a plate. This is not the first time I’ve gone on a wild trout chase: It likely, so long as I keep my health, won’t be my last. But as I wade into the stream, I should have known that:

1. Jimber was fibbing; or

2. I had the wrong stream.

The creek bottom isn’t pebbled and rock: It’s loon shit; thick with mud and silt, likely the result of a beaver dam further downstream. Now beaver dams, over the short term, can be great for brook trout fishing. The trout are trapped behind the dam and grow fat and impatient and hungry. But the downside to beaver dams is the silt: As the stream flows, it carries dirt and sand and debris with it. This natural trash piles up behind the dam and covers the sand and gravel beds where brookies lay their eggs. The long term impact of a beaver dam on a good trout stream is three or four years of great fishing followed by a collapse of the trout population.

“Shit”.

That’s me, about an hour into my trudge downstream on the secret creek. I make a half mile wading the oozy, yucky streambed. Walking along the bank isn’t an option: One one side, the floodplain of the creek is a mass of humps of swamp grass, the heaps of earth and root nearly waist high. On the other bank, there are black alders as thick as lambs’ wool. After stumbling and bumbling my way downstream, like I said, for over an hour, I make the decision to retreat. I’ve had one strike, a nice tug that ended up with an empty hook, but I don’t have the confidence to proclaim the fish that took a swipe at the offering was a trout and not a chub.

The path back is torturous.

“Shit.”

That’s me realizing the new worm carrier I’d just paid ten bucks for had, somewhere in the jungle of cedars and alders, slipped free of my belt and found a new home. So too my beloved Swiss army knife and black leather sheath, a knife I’ve had for over twenty years.

Damn Wal-Mart belt. I should have never listened to Harry.

I sit in the parking lot of the Two Harbors Tourist Information center listening to MPR and eating McDonalds for lunch. I have my faithful guide to Wisconsin and Minnesota trout streams open to the North Shore. I had a favorite stream picked out to fish. I had a plan. But despite the two hours I just wasted proving my age along the banks of a useless piece of troutless water, I feel adventurous. I change plans. I’m being called to a stream I’ve never fished by a ten year old guide book. It’s a  mistake I’ve made before but one that I’m willing to make again just for the sake of a story.

10″ Native Rainbow Trout I released.

I catch and release a nice, fat native rainbow trout on the stream and I catch and release a 7″ brookie all within the first ten minutes of wading the North Shore river. But the stretch of water I work is bouldery and flat; there are no pools, no undercut banks, no trees down creating trouty places. I work this first stretch for two hours and never have another bite.

I do manage, despite using an ash walking stick I peeled and carved after my last trout excursion (where I tumbled and spilled on slippery stones any number of times with, thankfully, only a few minor bruises), to once again deposit my large ass on a boulder and turn an ankle. I decide to leave this part of the river and search out the darker, calmer, deeper reaches of its nature. I decide, rather than slipping and sliding my way downstream, to bushwhack up a steep hill to the where I believe (I really don’t know for certain) I’ll connect with the Superior Hiking Trail. I am reduced to clawing my way up an earthen cliff, pulling my soggy, tired body up the slope by grabbing onto trees and roots. But I am rewarded when, indeed, I stand on the pinnacle of the ridge on a well maintained hiking path.

Looking over the river valley from the trail.

Four hours and no fish for the frying pan, a bruised ass, a lost knife, a lost worm holder, and half the worms I started out with, I think as I drive inland on gravel in search of the place the authors of my  guidebook say is a much better place to catch fish. Thankfully, I had a spare worm container in the car that didn’t get lost in my ill-fated trek down no-name creek. Otherwise, I’d be tossing flies into trees and making a damn fool out of myself. Yes, I have flies with me. Dry flies and wet flies sit, pretty much virgin and unused, in an aluminum case in my fishing vest. I have no idea how to “present” them to fish, as the experts say. I only know worms and I am happy I have some left.

The piece of water I fish, after the dust settles and I pull the Pacifica into the woods, is gorgeous.

Why the hell didn’t I start here?

Oh, I’ll be candid. The first few tosses into swirling water don’t amount to anything. The beginning stretch I worked pretty much reminded me of the flat, uninteresting topography I’d just left behind. But once I round the first bend, man, what a difference! There are impediments, man-made and natural, allowing the water to deepen without building up silt. And behind the rocks and trees and decaying structures are brookies. Fat, black backed, hungry, gloriously painted native trout.

The pond where I lost the big one.

I catch five nice (8″-10″) vigorous, dancing, tugging speckled fish in one pond. I watch a pair of blue winged teal emerge silently from rushes along the shore a few feet from where I fish, completely unconcerned about my presence. It’s the only wildlife I’ve seen today (except for a fat grouse who sat on a stump, three feet from my head as I stumbled through balsams along no-name creek). I release two smaller brookies and,down to my last three pieces of worm, decide to try a beautiful pool of black water for one last fish. On the very first cast, I hook into a monster. From the pull of the fish, from the weight of its power, from the bend of my fly rod, I can tell this fish is at least twice the size of the nice ones already in my fishing vest. I play the fish until its near the steep rooty bank where I lose her (I’m assuming it was a fat female heavy with spawn getting ready to lay her eggs). She’s smart, that big fish: I can’t entice her to bite again. I do catch one last nice fish for the frying pan as the sun descends over the treetops to the west.

The River at the end of the day.

I clamber down the riverbed until I can see the bridge. I make an executive decision to leave the water. I bushwhack again, fighting the thick boreal forest of my native land, until, exhausted, I spy the shiny blue of my car through the trees.

I take out the six small members of the char family that I have managed to catch on this fine, fine late summer day. Despite my ass throbbing like someone has branded me, I am infinitely happy.

Maybe next time I’ll try flies, I think as I pull the Pacifica onto gravel and head home.

Brookies ready for the frying pan

Peace.

Mark