Fishing about and about fishing
FISHERMAN'S WIFE'S LOGBOOK - A FISHING LORE SAGA
I just finished reading a book by Michele Longo Eder - a fisherman's wife from Newport, Oregon. The book - Salt in our Blood - is a sort of a log-book extending over about 2 years of her and her family's life, written from the point of view of a wife of a commercial fisherman, a skipper-owner. Bob Eder's and his two sons' two boats, Michele Ann and Nesika, were fishing crab and fish pots. The book starts with quoting President J.F.Kennedy:
"I really don't know why it is that all of us are so committed to the sea… All of us have, in our veins, the exact same percentage of salt in our blood that exists in the ocean, and therefore, we have salt in our blood, in our sweet, in our tears. We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch it, we are going back from whence we came".
While marine fishing has retained for years the unwelcome title of the most dangerous occupation of them all, shellfish potting as practiced in America is one of the more dangerous marine fishing methods. This, because the 35 to 45 kg heavy pots are stacked 4 to 5 high on the deck, which willy-nilly raises the vessel's centre of gravity, thus reducing stability, and the fishing itself is mostly done in oceanic, non-protected waters.
The book is a saga of a fishermen's wife's and mother's life , her own lawyer's career, chores of housewife and fishing business shore-services, representing her men's business interests, and, tragically so, also of bereavement and mourning. Michele and Bob lost their elder son to the ocean, when on Dec. 12, 2001 his boat Nesika capsized drowning Ben and three other crew members: Rob Thompson, Jared Hamrick and Steve Langlot. In simple words and without beating about the bush, Michele candidly conveys feelings, joys, doubts, and frustrations, not only her own, but also of other members of her family.
The following few excerpts from Michele's book superbly convey the feelings and anxieties of a fisherman's wife, the personal sacrifices she must make, and the strength she' been demonstrating in attending to the complex multifarious workings of her Jewish-Catholic lay family. Here they go:
"I haven't seen the movie The Perfect Storm, and I don't intend to. As a fisherman's wife and a mother of two sons who participate in this fishery, that's a little too much reality for me".
"I miss Bob, but my misery over his being away and fishing on Christmas is pointless. This is just another holiday he isn't home, and we're all accustomed to that".
"It's unnerving when they're all gone to sea, and worse, when one of the boys is fishing on a boat without Bob. I can't decide which is scarier, having all my men on one boat, or split up between Michele Ann and Nesika. The background buzz in my thinking, the worrying about them when they are out fishing, doesn't quite down until they're all safely home".
"…I decided not to run for the House seat. I'm bummed. I'm pissed off at myself. I don't have the courage to do work I know I would be really good at. Instead, I fit my life around Bob's life. It doesn't matter how much Bob thinks he needs me and my help; the reality is it wouldn't be good for our marriage to be separated more than we already are".
"I've knocked myself out the past few days, between work and helping Bob get ready to (go fishing off) California, and, of course, "Crew Thanksgiving." What a blast. I shopped last Wednesday and Thursday, and started cooking on Friday".
"Hog rings. I'm on an errand to get 500 to 1,000 of them. "Number 3s" - Bob tells me. I have no idea what a hog ring is for, only that they are at the Feed and Seed store and Bob needs a lot of them".
"On December 11, 2001, the F/V Nesika capsized. She was discovered upside down in the water by the skipper of another boat. Despite Coast Guard search and other local crab boats that rushed to help, all 4 crew-members, including the author's son, Ben Eder, died at sea".
The tragedy shocked the Eder family like a prolonged earthquake, and it took a long time for their life to become again close to normal as the pain subsided. The enormity of their loss shows up in many different ways in Michele's book in the chapters that follow Ben's drowning, where in detail she describes the tragedy and all the debris it carried in its wake.
It was quite unnerving to read about the bureaucratic rigmarole the family met before they eventually, and only after a local parliamentarian's intervention, received a proper death certificate for Ben. Equally frustrating was the treatment they received from their insurance company and its lawyers, who looked for any possible pretext to reject Eders' claim.
Salt in our Blood is an unusual and admirable book, which draws the reader into a fishing family, to a degree that eventually one feels himself as one of its friends. I'm strongly recommending its reading to everybody, but in particular, to male fishermen. It would make them to understand better their wives' love, moods, feelings and frustrations.
F/V NESIKA, beached after capsizing, with Coast Guard personnel on board.
Ben Eder preparing sablefish pots
The Eders, Nov. 2001.