Sunday was Father’s Day.  The great day when we honor our fathers and try to come up with something meaningful for a gift.  My 10 year old made a plaster mold of an apple that she was very excited about.  They can’t make ashtray’s in school any more.  I did manage to curtail the sarcasm and embrace the meaning of the gift as well as toss some change in it.

I love my kids and they are a lost of fun, and a great source of frustration and cantankerosity.  If you are ever going to be a real Cantankerous Old Coot, you must have kids, they bring out that certain…something that you just can’t get organically.

So on Sunday, Fathers Day, I get to do what I want right?  Well I wanted to sleep all day but that wasn’t happening so I went to my backup, Fishing.  Always ready to go fishing.  I did need to get my little boat ready and set up so we could take it.  This is where I start to notice I am turning into my father.  I have avoided that for almost 36 years but it is now coming on me.

I was busy getting things from my shed to put in the boat and was trying to get my 7 year old to help me.  You know important things like seats, or life jackets, or gas for the motor.  it was getting hot, and I actually said to my son, “If your not going to help just get the hell out of the way!”  Wow, that is what my dad used to say to me.

After the third or fourth time I had to stop and think “Stop it!” I took a breath and tried to reset and pull away from that black hole of A-type personality that has my Dad at the center of it like some evil emperor sitting on a throne of my crushed dreams and abandoned hopes.

I really don’t want to burden my kids that way.  I would like to leave them hopes and dreams as they grow.  While that may not be very Cantankerous, it will at least keep my kids close to the family.

I finally got everything together all the while muttering under my breath very cootishly.  Eventually we hit the lake and got actually fishing.  I took my son out for the first round and he “fished”  and darn near caught something in his first 10 minutes.

Me? I was fighting the boat in the wind and the waves so my pole sat in the rod holder and bent with the speed of the boat.  Eventually I swapped my son for my daughter who didn’t want to fish until I told her I would leave her in the middle of the lake to swim back unless she fished.  She fished.

Didn’t catch anything with her either.  I still had a great time out on the water fishing with my kids.  I know they will be out on their own way too fast and these are important times.  I also wish they would be some sort of luck when it came to fishing.

My dad always caught twice as many as I did even using the same bait.  I can’t wait until I hit that point.

Then maybe I wont have to load everything back up by myself and mutter again at how much crap we need to take.

Have a good one, Coots lesson #6 is up for Friday and Ralph has a great cantankerous rant for Monday.  Look for Coots products coming soon!

-Justin