By Andrew Friedman

Beep…. Beep … Beep. It was my alarm blaring through my room on a warm summer morning. When I woke up at 4 in the morning, I crawled my way out of bed and into a cold shower, hoping it would give me an extra boost for the day. After the shower, while I was brushing my teeth, I felt so zombie-like, as I was tired from not sleeping at all from excitement about what I was about to do later that day. I packed my bags and was almost ready to go when I realized that I was extremely hungry. Being an independent 9-year old, I decided not to wake anyone up and make my own toast. I also had a nice bowl of fresh-cut fruit with some scrumptious Honey Nut Cheerios.

DING DONG, DING DONG went the doorbell that seemed like a nuclear bomb warning had gone off and woke up my whole house. My dad came down to say goodbye as I left with my nonna (Italian for grandma) to go up north to the cottage.

We began our journey up the 400 Ontario highway at roughly 5 in the morning. We had to make a stop at my great-uncle Sergio’s house because he had all of the supplies and the keys to the cottage. He would be coming with us on our epic journey later that day. The urban city apartment buildings slowly turned into endless grass and farmland as we kept on going north. Roughly halfway there, we got to my great uncle’s house. The sun was just rising as you could just see the silhouette of zio Sergio sitting on his lawn chair, drinking a coffee and reading the newspaper. He was all ready to go up north. We kept on heading to the cottage. As my nonna’s old 1989 Pontiac kept chugging along, we decided to make a stop for gas to ensure safe arrival at our Bala cottage. When we stopped for gas, I decided to get out of the car and use the restroom. With the 20 dollars my mom gave me, I also bought myself a Kit Kat bar for the journey later in the day. Sergio decided to get some bait for the journey.

We were almost there when the car came to a sudden halt, waking me up from my deep slumber. We stopped off at Sobeys to get groceries for the next couple of days at the cottage. Shortly after the grocery store, we arrived in Bala just before 8 in the morning. My uncle Claudio was all ready for us to go on our journey. Before I ran down to the dock, I put on my life jacket and got my fishing rod out of the boathouse so that I could get a good seat for the long boat ride ahead. We had decided to test our luck early at the first spot of the day because some days the fish don’t bite.

Just like most days, the fish were not biting and we spent what seemed like hours on the windy waters of Lake Muskoka. There were very few words spoken, mostly Italian, which I hardly understood. It was a dreary morning, and the stagnant smell of the water filled our noses. The 30 minutes we spent there were without any nibbles—we didn’t catch a single fish. We were not discouraged; we did not come all the way from Toronto just to quit.

The further and further we went, the colder and windier it got. Spot 2 – nothing. Spot 3 – nothing. Spot 4 – we got one fish but it was too small to keep. Spot 5, 6, and 7- we got the same as spots 1-3. Then finally we stopped the boat right by a bridge where a train was passing. My uncle had let his line go right under the boat, and in what seemed like seconds, we had our first fish aboard. I had let my line go too, deciding to try the same thing and just let the line sink and hope to get something, and then it happened. It was a huge fish that was probably heavier than I was. I pulled the rod up as fast as I could, but I stopped and the line went flat. My uncle who had seen the pure joy in my face from almost catching my first “big one” instead of a “piccolo” (which means small in Italian) also saw it snap just like my line as it was stuck under a rock. I then spent the next 15 minutes trying to put a hook and weight back on my line, all while my uncle and Sergio caught fish after fish, “big one” after “big one.” I was happy because we were catching fish, but at the same time, I felt sad as I was not catching food for my family.

Discouraged, I got my line back in the water and played around, jigging my line up and down, up and down, up and down, hoping that on some prayer I would catch a fish. Then I felt it. I was sure that I had a fish, but I did not want to scare it away, so I slowly started to reel it in, not wanting to alarm Sergio and my uncle, who by now had at least 4 fish apiece. I decided to catch it all on my own. By now I could tell that the “big one” was getting close, because it started to pull away more and more. I was certain that I would get the fish. My uncle saw it fly out of the water and it was a beautiful bass.

I used all of my weight and strength, screaming that I was finally going to get a “big one.” Sergio came and had the net ready for our one shot at the beautiful pesce (Italian for fish). My uncle was giving me tips, telling me what to do to make sure that it would catch my fish. Don’t give up. Non mollare. Keep your head up. Tieni la testa alta. You can do it. Puoi farlo.

It was so close, I could feel the fish in my hands. The pull of the fish was almost too much for me to handle, but I could not let it go and disappoint my family. I could not let waking up so early affect me. I could not let the pain of my muscles let me down. I had to get this fish in the boat. It was almost in the boat. Thud. Thud. Thud. I could feel my heart racing as I could see the glare of the fish in the water from the hot summer sun. It was in the boat at last, and all that hard work, practicing and dedication had finally paid off. The best part of all was being able to smell the foul scent of the fish that I had caught.

We got back to the cottage as quickly as we could. It was almost 2, and we were all getting very hungry. When we got back, my whole extended family was there: aunts, uncles, cousins, great aunts, great uncles–you name it. We were all crammed into our little bungalow cottage built in the 1980s. It was home. Everyone was so happy for me, smiling and eager to see my fish. At dinner later that day, we decided to celebrate my fish with a bottle of champagne. Being 9, I was still small and, in their eyes, I was still the little boy they all adored. I felt so proud to be able to tell them that I had finally caught “a big one.”