When we all get to Heaven,
What a day of rejoicing that will be!
When we all see Jesus,
We'll sing and shout the victory!
I was reminded of this refrain today when I happened across a Wired2Fish online article written by Walker Smith (left).
It seems that he recently had spent a day fishing on his home lake...one in which the lake had kicked him in the teeth.
"I went in with a solid game plan and came out with a big, heaping slice of nasty humble pie," he explained. "It happens to me more than I care to admit, but this particular evening, I got to thinking about something on the short drive back to my house: What's it going to be like when a fisherman gets to Heaven?"
As Smith admitted, "It's a pretty loaded question, I know. But these are the things a busy-minded, red-bearded, God-fearing redneck thinks about.
* Will we still get skunked, even when we think we're on the juice?
* Are we going to have to dodge kamikaze jetskis driven by 13-year-olds jacked up on caffeine and adrenaline?
* Will our crankbait hooks still get tangled at the end of a long cast?
* Are we still going to get enormous backlashes when we try to make that tricky skip cast underneath the best-looking boat dock on the lake? And spend 30 minutes trying to pick it out, only to find our brand-new line now feels like overcooked bacon?
* Will there still be that one freaking loop at the bottom of our spool that requires us to strip off 600 yards of line from our reel to fix?
* When we try to reel said line back onto our spool, are we still going to have to untangle the slack from every freaking reel handle on our front deck?
* Are we going to nearly somersault backwards into the lake when we set the hook on what we think is a giant bass, only to find it's only a three-finger bluegill?
* When schoolers start breaking the surface, and we rush to throw our favorite topwater lure at 'em, will the treble hooks still get snagged on our line guides, electronics mounts, carpet, rub rail, seats, pants, shoelaces, or other lures?
* Will there still be hidden chicken wire under boat docks to snag our favorite jigs?
* Are those big bass going to keep doing backflips over our topwater frogs and still somehow never even get close to the hooks?
* Is our knot going to break mid-cast and send our favorite 10-year-old lure soaring into the next dimension, never to be found again?
* Are our fishing buddies going to keep kicking our butts from the back deck of our own boats?
* Will we still get slapped in the head with a half-ounce spinnerbait and almost pass out after our buddy makes a crazy side-armed cast?
* Am I still going to fall off my boat trailer in front of hundreds of people at the launch in 35-degree weather and come up gasping for air, looking like a waterlogged rodent and coughing and gagging on lake water?
* Will my fingers still get pinned together by a brand-new treble hook while trying to unhook a 12-inch bass?
* Are our co-anglers still going to cast lipless crankbaits onto the highway above the bridge we're fishing and actually hook a chicken truck while it snaps their rod in half?
* Are we finally going to learn why these dang post-frontal bass won't eat anything that we throw at 'em?
* Will we still inexplicably hook an occasional 10-inch bass in the butt and fight it like a 10-pounder?
* Will we still forget to strap down our rods, hit a rogue wave, and watch our $300 combo skip across our front deck like a river rock and fall into 60-foot-deep water?
* Will we still slam our jig into a dock and make a horrifically loud sound and feel like we've scared every bass in the entire lake?
* When we post a big-fish photo on Facebook, will people still say it's been photoshopped?
In closing, Smith said, "It would sure be nice to catch big ones every cast in Heaven, but to be honest, I kind of hope the frustrating things still will happen. They're where the best stories come from. They're what makes for the best laughs with our buddies. And most importantly, they keep us humble and coming back for more."
A hearty AMEN!
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