A Fish Story

Legend has it there was this fish.... a Kingfish. He'd been around for awhile, as he was about 4 foot long and weighed 22 lbs. He primarily lived in the relatively shallow waters about a mile off the coast of Clearwater Beach. Last Saturday he was taking his afternoon swim, looking for Pinfish to snack on to keep his energy up. Little did he know that before the afternoon was over, the last Pinfish he would eat would change his life forever.... quickly.


Coincidently, a group of 11 men from CLAY men's ministry in Clearwater had determined to take a deep sea fishing trip that same day. They hired two boats, each with a captain and mate, and headed out to sea for the day. It was a beautiful day, sunshine with calm winds and a moderate temperature. What a great time of trying to put an end to large fishes lives by tricking them into eating pinfish that had hooks in them. These hooks were attached to an almost invisible line that could then be used to pull those fish into their boat and put them in an ice chest to flop around until they die. All without the fish being able to stop them.


The men went out as far as 18 miles and stopped at various places throughout the gulf, keeping some fish, but throwing back many that were too small. Late in the afternoon it was time to head home, but they felt they should stop one more time before they called it a day...... about a mile off of Clearwater Beach........


That's when these two worlds collided...... Man vs. Fish..... dum da dum dum, dum da dum dum DUM! (Please sing that part.)


Okay, I won't bore you with the rest of this drawn out story. Suffice it to say I was the winner of this man vs. fish battle. The last catch of the day before we went in. It was my turn to watch THAT pole, and when it started bending I knew I had won the jack pot. I was able to pull in the biggest catch of the day, and loved every minute of it. He ran about 100yds, let me pull it in some, and took off some more, but I was finally able to get it into the boat..... Sweet!


Of course, I'll include a picture so you don't think this is just another fish story. I know how those one armed fisherman are when they're telling their stories....


My only real disappointment of the day was that morning when I asked my pastor to leave his boat and come over to ours to talk and he wouldn't walk over to us..... I'm starting to get a little concerned. Maybe he's not all he says he is.....


Anyway, a day that will go down in the Steen anals (is that how you spell that?) of fishing....