05/27/2026
Wednesday with Wyatt
This time of year, school is out, summer is beginning, and the fishing memories surround me.
When Wyatt was 13, we started fishing together a lot. I mean real fishing, not the kind where I’m handing him my rod after I get one on the line. It was almost always for largemouth bass, and Wyatt, true to form, was all in. He would spend hours in his room rebuilding old garage sale reels, fine-tuning his new ones, and constantly respooling everything with fresh line. If he wasn’t doing that, he was watching YouTube fishing videos or researching new lures he wanted us to try.
“Real fishing” started with Uncle Buddy’s leaky aluminum jon boat. From there, we graduated to a less leaky two-man bass boat, and eventually Wyatt persuaded me to go halves on two used kayaks.
“Dad, I promise we’ll love these.”
He was right. I still fish out of one of those kayaks today.
One day, when he was 15, we were out in the two-man boat, and I brought a bucket of minnows. I rigged one rod with a bobber in hopes of catching some crappie and encouraged Wyatt to do the same. He declined and smarted off about it being “grandpa fishing” and said he was only interested in “hog hunting,” meaning big bass.
When we reached one of my favorite spots on the pond, I switched over to my crappie rod, slipped on a live minnow, and quickly caught one and then another.
“Wyatt, you sure you don’t want to switch over? It looks like they’re biting. I’ve got everything you need right here.”
“Nope. Hog hunting.”
“Okay.” Then I caught another and another.
Pretty soon, I was catching crappie so fast that, instead of putting them in the basket, I just started tossing them into the bottom of the boat around Wyatt’s feet. Honestly, though, I had time. Finally, I made one last plea.
“Wyatt, are you sure you don’t want to try this?”
Battling against his pride, the heart finally won out just enough for him to muster out, “Sure.”
The sun was starting to get low, and just like when he was a little kid, I said, “Here, just take my rod.”
I’ve come to realize now that real fishing has nothing to do with who’s holding the rod. It’s who you are with.
Love yourself and be brave - Tyson
