I cast it back but hte string doesn’t fall down into the water when i push it forward. I look back and the wire is gone. The hook is gone too. Did it get stuck? It probably got caught in one of the branches again. I pull on it once more and then I hear my dad cry out. I found the hook. It’s on my dad’s jacket. He yells to me in Spanish to get myself over there asap to entangle him out of my wire and his. It;s too hard. THere are too many knots. And its almost dark. We have to get back to camp…

We bough it on ebay. It was an auction lot of two rods and a completely filled tackle box. We were sure we were going to catch ourselves some dinner. We were wrong. For years, we’ve been trying to catch a single fish, but we’ve never even gotta  bite. Now, it just sits tehre on the floor of our garage. Gathering dust, losing its old red clor. We’ve added brothers and sisters, but they’re no use either. We’ve never caught a fish. It’s disappointing. We go to different places every year to try our luck, but we still come up short. But hey, at least it was cheap. And it does bring back the memories I’ve shared with my father.

I’m tired of waiting for fish to bite my bait. Completely given up. I throw the pole into the ocean in a fit of anger. The pole dives into the sea. It breaks the surface of the glistening water. It interrupts a school of fish, and nearly impales a little clownfish. Nemo? Thud. It hits the sand. Sand covers it– the useless fishing pole. It is finally out of my hands.