Ending...

Waking up the next day, MC realizes that he needs to patch things up with the women in his life. So one by one he talks to Jessie, sister in-law, and mother-in-law. They all forgived him, happily ever after.Maybe not so much. All his time the author is hinting not very covertly about something happening to Paul. I predict he's going to die. After fishing at Seeley lake with Paul and Neal, Paul and MC were sick of Neal so they drove up to their father and mother's house. Their father is a retired preacher and a very good fisherman himself, having taught both of his sons. After a long greeting where their mom is really excited to see Paul, Paul leaves a little after dinner to "meet up with some friends" Their father knows what he's up to, and almost tries to talk to MC about it. He stops mid-sentence. The next day, all three of them go fishing on the big blackfoot. All three catch their limit and it is easy for me to picture this scene with the sun, and the water and the big fish jumping out of the water. Father was fishing one hole, and then at the end stopped and Paul moved over to catch "one last fish" in the same hole his father was, he caught a massive rainbow trout, and fought it for a long time, having lots of fun. After he got to the bank where his brother and father were resting, he said something about needing three more years before he could think like a fish. He didn't get three more years, because six months later, MC drove up to the parents house and broke the news that Paul had been beat to death with the butt end of a revolver. The last scene in the book was MC wondering what he could have done and realizing that he couldn't have done anything. He was his own man, and haunted by waters, he made his own choice. This connects to the world because a lot of really god people get killed for no reason, and i think it's because we focus too much on the bad stuff and not on the the good stuff. (read coffee news)

Fishing

Once Paul and MC got back to the truck, MC has almost a whole page dedicated to hating Neal. He talks about Neal lying, taking up all the room, drinking too much, not being able to stand enough drink, dating a whore, how he dresses, etc etc. Not only does MC hate Neal, but now all three women (Jessie, MC's mother in-law, and sister in law, who is the wife of Ken) are really mad at MC. Once home, MC sulks around for a little while, and then calls Paul to go to their camp on a lake called Seeley Lake. My prediction is that something is going to happen to Paul. The author is hinting that MC is going to have his last fish with Paul at some time soon. He might die, but I think he's just not going to be able to fish anymore. Paul and MC are driving to Seeley Lake, when Paul starts talking about some girl he just picked up. MC was in the same predicament, not knowing whether he was in trouble with a girl or he was bragging. Once they get to Seeley lake, Neal and Old Rawhide show up in a truck with a coffee can, no worms, and no rod. They say that they want to go fishing. It's noon and really hot, so the fishing will be terrible, but they go anyway. I relate to my life in this one. I know some people that want to hang out with older kids, but they don't know how to do anything we do. This is like Neal's situation with Paul and MC, except he doesn't care that much. MC catches a few, but it is too hot to do anything else, so he sits in the shade and forgets his troubles. The two brothers had hidden beers in the rocks for the walk back home, but Neal took them and drank them. They found Neal and Old Rawhide facedown in the sand with no clothes on and a major sunburn. They gathered them up and took them back into town, and they kicked Old Rawhide out of the van, much to her dismay because she had no clothes on. I can visualize this scene because theres a half-naked prostitute running across town with two men following her until she goes back to the sketchy part of town. I can imagine kids getting their eyes covered by their mothers and guys leaning really far out their windows. This scene makes me laugh.

Fishing with Neal

At the bar, Neal was using a strategy of his to get women: ignore them until they can't stand it anymore and break down and talk to him, and it was working very well. So instead of talking to Old Rawhide, he talked to Long Bow, the indian. People called him Long Bow behind his back, but no one else dared to call him that face to face. it seems to me that Neal is the kind of guy that lies to experts. Neal can't fish, but he lies to Paul, a fishing god about it. Neal can't trap or hunt, but he lies to Long Bow about it. One of his stories he was following an otter and her pups in 69 degrees below zero, the otter had turned white, and was in Roger's pass in the high mountains. Finally, Old Rawhide caves and says to Neal: "Hey Buster, what are otters doing on top of the continental divide? They live in rivers and play in mud." Also, in the dead of winter, otters wouldn't have pups. (she called everyone Buster, because she had slept with so many men she couldn't remember all of their names.) MC left without Neal to get some sleep. The next morning, even though Paul was out late, he was in Wolf Creek the next morning ready to go fishing with MC. Neal was coming too, but he had a major hangover and his mom went soft on him and brought the mattress into the back of a flat bed truck driven by Jessie's only brother that stayed in Wolf Creek. His name was Ken, and his wife was a RN. It was his truck that they all rode in the back of down to a river named the Elkhorn. This connects to my life because I remember on time me and a bunch of my friends all piled into the back of my Dad's truck to go fishing in the pond down the road. (Unlike Paul and MC, we didn't catch anything.) The Elkhorn is a slow, small river with mostly eastern brook trout, but sometimes massive brown trout came all the way up. The boys all piled out of the truck and Paul was already ready before anyone else. Jessie had told MC to not let Neal out of his sight, but Neal was fishing in the dead water with worms and still not catching anything, so MC ditched him and caught six brook trout quickly. Then MC realized that there was no was no way Paul was catching his limit of brookies, so he decided to catch one of those massive browns. Walking down the river, MC noticed a stretch of water where no fish were jumping, and it wasn't because there was no fish in there. Changing his flies, he casted everywhere in the hole with no luck. Then, he realized that the brown was under the willows and bushes on the side of the creek, because Paul had told that a couple summers ago. Casting into the trees, he hooked a monster, but he got it all caught up in the trees and lost it. His brother came up with a basket full of fish, and he said that he had caught them in shallow, open water. That's the thing, though. You learn a trick from the master and use it when the master is doing the opposite thing. MC walked back up to the truck, where the girls were making lunch. Neal was laying down on the mattress with a serious case of sun stroke, and all three girls were really mad at MC for leaving Neal. It was pouring now, but the girls still wouldn't give MC a seat. Ken tried to start the truck, but he couldn't, because Neal didn't put water in the radiator and it overheated. So MC and Paul pushed the truck all the way back to Wolf Creek. I predict that that Neal is going to catch a huge fish and surprise everyone even though he's really stupid.

MC takes Paul and Mo-se-na-tah, his girl, back to Paul's apartment. MC drives back to wolf creek, where his house is and tries to get some sleep, even though it is now dawn. The dawn brings more questions for MC, except they're not new, they're the same old questions burning down in his gut, eating away and making him hungry for answers. Questions like how does he know when he needs help, before he goes and does something like this? Does he need help? Yes. He does. But he doesn't want it and especially not from his brother, not because he hates his brother but because it would be embarrassing. Once home and awake, Jessie, (MC's wife) reminds him they are going to pick Jessie's brother up at the train station. MC's brother in-law says he fishes, but he doesn't even know how to fly-cast, and in Montana, if you don't fly-fish, you don't fish. At the train station I noticed three things.

1. Neal has white flannels and two v-neck sweaters, and he looks like a tennis player but can't play tennis.

2. He has no fly-rod, or rod of any kind for that matter.

3. He doesn't even acknowledge MC, even though he's staying at MC's house.

This is an easy scene to visualize for me, because I have scene a lot of movies with old-time trains and train stations. When Neal walks off the train looking like a fake tennis player with fancy shoes and an old straw suitcase with his mother's initials on it. In western Montana in the 1930s, there was not a lot of people who looked like that, especially in Wolf Creek, a town of about 250 people. Jessie's mother is also there. That night, Neal goes to the only bar in town, an upside down railroad car called Black Jack's. I can imagine the dusty lightbulbs and the bar that is actually a huge tree split in half by someone who can't use an ax. There is two people at the bar, Old Rawhide, the towns only prostitute, and Long Bow, an indian who got his name because he supposedly "pulls the long bow" (exaggerates). MC knows he doesn't lie, because he's seen it happen. Old Rawhide ends up taking a liking to Neal.

More book

MC is staying at Paul's house right now. He gets a call at 2:00 in the morning saying he better get down to the police station right now. Driving down, waking up, and thinking it over, he gets there and slowly realizes, (as he wakes up) what must have happened. The desk sergeant tries to make MC understand by explaining that Paul has gotten into a couple of fights at a place called Hot Springs. Hot Springs is a gambling place where Paul goes to play poker. He beat a guy up for making fun of his girl, who is indian and a beautiful dancer. MC really wants to help Paul, but he doesn't know how because he doesn't understand him. MC loves his brother, but can't tell, during a normal conversation whether Paul is asking for help or bragging. MC's not jealous or loathing he just doesn't know what to do. Except take him fishing. I can see where MC is coming from, not by my own experience, but it makes sense. You love someone but you don't undertand them and all this even though you know this person better than anyone. It's easy for me to visualize this scene from the book, walking into the jail, smelling booze and things you don't want to know about, and seeing Paul and his girl, the indian girl, with the shiny hair sitting in the corner together. Paul has his overdeveloped casting arm over his face and he doesn't want to know what's going to happen tomorrow.

Reading

Today i was reading "A river runs through it" and it introduced the two main characters, two brothers who were taught fly-fishing when they were young, by their father. The main character, (we don't know his name) is married and a family man now, because they are both 30. But Paul, his brother, drinks, gambles, likes to street fight, and is the best fisherman ever. The main character, (we can call him MC) wants to fish with his brother in-law, but Paul won't, because he's a bait fisherman. Anyway, Paul and MC are going fishing on the big blackfoot which is a river they both grew up fishing on. MC finds a nice hole and catches a massive trout, and Paul wast casting off a rock and people stopped to admire him because he is so good at casting. Paul catches a huge trout also. Right now in the book, Paul got into a bunch of street fights and now is in trouble with police. I can visualize Paul doing his own brand of casting, called shadow casting, were the line scrapes across the water before flipping up and landing.

Reading