Thursday, September 18, 2014

My Fishy Fear

There are a lot of things in this world that people are afraid of: heights, flying, small spaces, and death.

Not me. My fear is fish.

Sorry, Bruce. Fish are not friends; they are, in fact, food.



My fear of fish can be traced back to when I was little. My dad used to take us girls to Free Fishing Day, a day where a bunch of fish were dumped into a little lake and kids could go fishing for free.

One fateful day, we went to take advantage of Free Fishing Day. It was pretty fun! Casting has always been my favorite part of fishing. Of course I wanted to catch a fish (especially if my sisters had already caught some), but sometimes casting and reeling in was enough to entertain me.

For the umpteenth time, I went through the motions of casting and reeling in. Suddenly, I felt a sharp tug at the end of my line. My hearth jumped into my throat, and then I got really excited. I got one! I thought.

I furiously reeled in my line, but found I had to struggle more than usual. My little brow furrowed as I struggled to get that fish to shore.

My parents finally noticed my struggling and chose to grab the video camera instead of helping me. At this point, I was panicking. This fish is going to drag me into the lake and eat me for breakfast! I'm too young to die! I could just read the newspaper headlines now: "Girl Gobbled by Giant Guppy" (my fish name vocabulary was really small).

The fish turned out to be an enormous carp, the biggest fish I have ever caught, and probably the biggest fish caught that day. It's a curse to be good at something you hate.

Since then, the scaly, slimy, wiggly fish have crept into my worst nightmares. It's even gotten to the point where I don't like swimming in open water for fear of what's under the surface nibbling my toes.

Let's just say I don't ever want to find Nemo. Or Dory. Or any fish. Ever.