This is the first in a series of true stories from my life told when I remember them, as I remember them, with the purpose of providing some kind of comic relief, thought provoking drama, nail biting suspense and/or, God willing, spiritual insight. Enjoy.
The Raw Bream
by Seth Hall
When I was in middle school, I would sometimes hang out with the older kids from the neighborhood, you know play basketball, skateboard, fish or whatever. Well, on one hot summer day, during my 6th grade year (1986-87), I happened to be hanging with three of them. One was a year older, the other about two and "the leader" was three or four years older. We were down at Shelley Lake in North Raleigh fishing, when one of them decided to joke about me eating a fish from the lake. I quickly replied "yeah right, I'm not eating a fish from this disease ridden lake" or something of that nature. (I had probably never heard the term disease ridden before in my life, but we'll say I had for the story's sake :) Well, when I said that, it got the other two into it and they decided that I was going to eat a fish from that lake, and a raw fish at that!!! Someone had just caught a brim, (probably me since eating a raw fish you'd just caught would be the most humiliating thing ever!), when they dragged me to the woods and proceeded to surround me, forcefully saying, "Eat it, eat it", "Heck no" I said. "Eat it, eat it", "No way man, I am not eating that" I replied, so on and so forth for the longest 30 minutes of my life. The more I said no, the more they insisted (you know, classic neighborhood bully behaviour) until one genius said, "How about if we cook it". I was so relieved to be moving on to the next level, that I said "OK", thinking that would never happen since none of us had any fire and we were a long walk from home. That did not matter. One of them quickly got up and run all the way around the lake to his house, returning 30 minutes later with his Rambo knife, (the popular 80's novelty knife with a compass on the handle that would unscrew to reveal a "survival kit" which contained a string saw, a knife sharpener, needle and thread, some fish hooks and you guessed it matches). Upon sight my stomach turned to knots and I started to get worried..... In my head I thought, "this might actually happen, please God don't let this happen. I always throw your fish back, you know, to keep the population going. Please God don't let this happen". I don't know if I actually thought in terms of God during the 6th grade, but I was definitely freaking out and asking for some kind of miracle. Anyway, as the "survivalist" unscrewed the compass and took out the "survival kit", I saw a pack of about 10 matches. One by one they proceeded to strike those matches in hopes of starting a fire, but by the grace of God they all broke, everyone of them. No lie. It was a long drawn out process, but none of those matches did their job of producing fire for man. Following this, the three of them decided to give up on the whole idea of killing me through the consumption of raw or undercooked disease ridden fish and we embarked on our journey home.
On the way home I remember feeling relief coupled with anger and betrayal. How could these jerks live with themselves? What did I do to them to deserve this? I would never know. Although we were never really close friends, I continued to see those guys around the neighborhood and we had some good times doing what neighborhood kids do. Last I heard the first guy was an engineer with a wife and a whole mess a kids, the other was working in computers and the third, the "leader", was an ordained preacher. I can only imagine that service. A lesson in humility, an ungodly scheme failed. Looks like God has a plan after all and it happens to involve me not dieing that day in the woods. OK, a little over dramatic I know. It involves me not getting really sick in the woods. Is that better?
Side note: I've been meaning to write the company that produced those knifes and thank them for making such a terrible product and ripping my "friends" off.
Lesson learned: Pick better friends
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4 comments:
My betrayal was the "see who can stay under water the longest" game. I won, only to find out that while I was holding my breath reveling in the greatness of my massive lungs, my 'friends' got out of the water and went home without me! Worse yet, I think it was some kind of breath-holding record and no one saw!
Do you know how long it took me to find out that it's spelled "bream" and not "brim"? I have made it part of my life's work to spread this knowledge. I'm glad you didn't eat it no matter how it's spelled.
fill it to the rim...with bream. kind of like the bass-o-matic sketches on NRFPT SNL.
good story, man. i was always the kid in your shoes. to this day, i have a problem with bullies. don't like 'em.
This sounds like the kind of kids in the neighborhood I grew up in. The kind of kids that when you are playing a game of poison on someone's basketball goal in the back yard they are hitting shots from over the house or kids that are crying when they are mowing the front lawn because it's full of wild onions. Or your friend is keeping you up all night to watch mystery science theater 3000. I feel your pain.
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