By the time I was a boy, things had changed a bit when setting out lines. Dad had on the order of 50 bamboo poles in a big bundle or two up in the rafters of our garage. Each pole was probably 8’ long. Each had a yard or so of stout line tied to the thin end. A big hook was tied to the free end of the line and a lead weight was wrapped around the line a few inches above that. Reflecting tape, either white or red, was wrapped around the end of the pole near where the line was tied on. An eye screw was fixed into the pole just a couple inches more than a yard from the end. By bending the pole a bit, the hook fit into that eye keeping everything neat and tidy for storage and transport. No one else I ever knew had anything like those bundles in their garage.
On a Saturday morning in the heat of summer, Dad would pull the car out of our (one-car) garage into the driveway. He'd get out the step ladder and drag down the bundles of poles from the rafters. He’d take the poles into the backyard in the shade under our apple tree. Then he’d set a lawn chair next to the bundles, get some emerypaper (fine sandpaper) from the basement, pull a cold Schlitz beer from the frig, sit in the lawn chair, and start checking the lines. Each hook had to be polished sharp and shiny with the emerypaper because the hooks would all have rusted since the last use. He’d also make sure the reflecting tape was still in place, that the line wasn’t frayed, that the hook was till tightly tied, that the pole wasn’t cracked or broken. As each pole was checked it would go into a pile on the other side of the chair, a sip of beer would be taken, and then the next pole checked. When they were all done, he’d tie them back into a couple of bundles and lay them next to the garage out of the way.
Then he’d go into the basement and start hauling up the rest of the gear: minnow seine, two or three metal minnow buckets, rubber waders, fishing rods and reels, tackle boxes, fish stringers, dip net, wire live-net, ice chest, battery operated headlamps, spare batteries, an ax, a hand-saw, a box of light-anywhere kitchen matches, battery operated radio, mosquito repellant, big stack of newspapers, blanket, some rope ends, light jackets, baseball caps. He’d fill a small wooden bucket with nightcrawlers (big, big earthworms) out of a box of them he kept in the basement. That dark rich loam that they lived in always smelled so good and clean and earthy to me. (How we used to catch those worms is a whole other story.) He’d fill the ice chest with beer and colas then throw in ice cubes from trays in our refrigerator. All this stuff would get piled on the front lawn near the driveway.
He’d get roof top luggage racks out of the garage next. No fancy Thule racks, these. They were strictly utilitarian: two 2"x2" wooden planks just the width of the car with two big rubber suction cups bolted to each and some straps with wide hooks fastened to the wood as well. The suction cups would sit on the roof and the hooks would fasten racks to the gutter of the car. You'd tighten everything down by pulling the straps and fastening their buckles -- not too tight because you could actually pull them enough to dent the roof of the car –- which I did once. No one else I knew had these racks in their garage either.
The bundles of poles went on top of the racks and were secured with clothesline or what ever other rope was handy. The loose ends of the line either got shut in the doors so the ends hung inside the car, or would get rolled up in the windows. He’d usually also secure the front of the bundles to the car bumper with another length of line. Apparently one time while driving at speed with the poles on top, the tie-downs holding the poles to the rack had broken. The poles had gone flying back over the roof and nearly caused an accident for the car following behind. Worse yet, some of the poles had broken. He never wanted that to happen again.
He’d load all the other gear in the car. It was a tight fit and usually quite a bit ended up in the back seat. The seine and minnow buckets had to be in easy reach; we'd need those first. Often the worm bucket ended up in the cooler. “For pete’s sake, don’t tell your mother”, he’d say. I thought it was great even when that dirty old bucket was sitting on my Cokes. Why is it that sharing secrets with one parent against the other is always such fun?
By this time it was usually 3PM or so. He’d go back in the house, catch his breath, kiss my mother good-bye, (she'd say, "Be careful."), and off we’d go. It was time to seine some “minnies”.
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