Kas, by Steve Evans

      Two days of fishing Long Beach Island mid-November might have gone by unremarkably. I fished sunset to dark the first evening, I fished sunrise the second morning and planned to fish the same night. On the incoming tide the first night I had three small bass topping out around twenty inches around the jetties at sixty-seventh street. The following day after nothing in that area at sunrise I moved my car. I parked at the eighth street access to Barnegat light state park around ten am with the sun climbing higher to fuss with gear and formulate a plan. There I noticed an angler, a middle aged gentleman of slight build in an orange down jacket, rain pants, gaff and rock cleats clear the trail head from the dunes.
      The conversation between strange fisherman is not unlike interactions between strangers in other customary social circles; the subtle bartering in the currency of trust and information; judgement, suspicion and curiosity; the establishment of commonality through esoteric displays of not-so-hidden knowledge, social niceties, quid pro quo and often a humble peppering of boastful talk.
      I asked how the morning's fishing had been and my counterpart shrugged an uninspired "nothing". We talked about fishing and I marked his equipment and attire as he unpacked and sorted by the tailgate of his car. From half a dozen hand made denim pockets sewn inside his jacket he brought out thick plastic bags each one rolled out with a lure inside, some lures had been touched up or modified with acrylic craft paints, he showed marks where some had been hit by fish and lamented others that remained untouched. he had a modified surf bag with extra pockets attached for his sandwich and water bottle and other considerations like a rope stringer for fish. His rod was a stout custom with a meticulously cared for Penn slammer from 1976 spooled with fifty pound test braided line.  His gaff had been extended ingeniously to an appropriate jetty length by connecting old titanium golf club handles, he marked that he had never used the gaff to land a fish but he felt it to be sufficient. He drew out an index card on which the tides were written. High would be in an hour. We agreed to meet out on the rocks.
      With the tide coming in strong, a heavy surf and a heavy northeast wind working, the water in the inlet was pretty aggressive. My new friend Kas worked his way, carefully casting from the middle of the jetty, backing up a rock or two lee side when an especially menacing set of waves bore down on the rocks.
      Having slept in my car the previous night still suited in my waders; which by definition is sleep only in the sense of vaguely not being awake and certainly not fishing, I was beginning to sense the  world under the sun increasingly surreal; the muffled boom of surf; the hot sensation of wind burn which I know should really feel cold; detached somehow from the labor of casting like an exhausted runner watching helplessly the dogged plodding of feet one after the other while the mind is delerious with fatigue.
      From a more rational standpoint my enthusiasm for daylight fishing for striped bass is luke warm. I said as much to Kas when we met at the eighth street access, but he said he was too old to fish at night. Scrappy and rescourceful in a way that's admirable: his homemade gaff with a strap to carry on his back, his refashioned attire, rock cleats, rope, knife, lures and line ready to handle a big fish on the rocks. From our talk I gathered that he fished this jetty often, though he had no brag of great fish, only griped somewhat that no legal flounder had come to hand for him this past season. I hoped that he would get a good fish today.
      About the time I was ready to hang up for the afternoon, exhausted and with a night of fishing yet to rest for, I shot a look over to Kas. I saw his knees were bent, his back arched, and his rod bowed deep and pulsing with the head shakes of a heavy fish. I watched him play out the fight as I knew he had imagined it, and bring the fish close as a crowd gathered. He unslung the gaff from his shoulder cooly, as a hand finds a pocket out of habit, though I knew he'd never used the thing before. He stuck the fish perfectly on the first shot and I was frozen with amazement, and a strange sort of pride, greater than if it had been my own fish to have seen his plan play out so perfectly.
      I moved over to him to take some pictures and he confirmed what I had suspected "this is my biggest fish!" and he glowed with pride. "HE TOOK SO FAR!...HE TOOK SO FAR!!" and then more cooly "that's why I have fifty".