stories

On one such trip, my good friend Chrisopher Kenny joined me. He had forgotten to bring a pair of water shoes (I refer here to standard shoes. My water shoes are a different matter altogether, and yes, they will work.) and resorted to walking barefoot in the river. I offered him my shoes, but he declined (what a pal!). I can not remember if he cut his feet, but water-borne microorganisms was a major topic of discussion. Perhaps the crayfish were drawn to his displeasure--we caught quite a few.

In fact, Chris later wrote a peer-recommendation for my college application, and included this crayfishing trip. I quote: "One afternoon, Matthew took me crayfishing. I, unfortunately, am rather daft when it comes to fishing and slipped in the mud numerous times. Instead of getting frustrated with my lack of ability and continue fishing, Matthew was always there with a helping hand to pull me back up and show me stones where he was certain the crustaceans were hiding. His home-made cages and nets snatched up crayfish by the dozen, and at outing�s end, we were both satisfied; Matthew with his great catch of crayfish, and me with my great catch of a friend." Here is dramatic proof that the pursuit of crayfish can get you into college.

Another time, I was crayfish alone and I forgot to bring a container in which to keep the crayfish. Like most people in that position would probably do, I took off one sock and dropped the crayfish in the sock. As I began to wade across the river to the Virginia shore (the fishing is better in Virginia), I heard animated shouts coming from an island a few hundreds of yards into the river.

As I neared the island, I realized that the shouts were not in fact coming from the island, but from behind the island: a huge log was slowly drifting down the river with five or six human passengers trying to stay balanced on top!

When I could make the figures perched on top of the log, I realized that I knew them. "Hamilton!" they cried. "What's in your sock?" I showed them my catch, and they were rightly impressed. "Hamilton!" said my friend Mike Gratz. "Let's eat the crayfish!" Mike is very resourceful but even he couldn't figure out a way to cook them in on an island. However, Brad Wilner volunteered the solution.

"Let's cook them in these soda cans," he said. We all built a small fire (in a hole, of course) and filled the cans half-way with river water. When the water came to a boil, we cooked the crayfish.

They tasted like unseasoned, underdone crustaceans cooked in muddy riverwater with a hint of aluminum.

Returning back from a crayfishing trip, I stopped by the local 7-11 to buy a slurpee. When I returned, slurpee in hand, I suddenly realized that in order to carry both the crayfish and slurpee back home, I would need to hold one of the two in my hand. These were the days before I got my driving license, and my mode of transportation was by bicycle.

I met David Gorman and Raj Deshmukh (I have yet to meet a finer "DJ") outside the convenience store and asked their advice.

"Why are you going to eat crayfish?" answered Dave. Dave is a vegetarian, so I didn't hold his inherent mistrust of crayfish cuisine against him. Raj, much more pragmatic than Dave, suggested I drink the slurpee and then transfer the crayfish into the empty containter. After all--he pointed out--slurpee containers have a lid well suited for crayfish transportation. It's curved, with a small hole, if you can picture it.

After thanking Raj and pardoning Dave, I continued on my way, biking up Wilson Lane to my house. The trip would have gone without incident had I not hit a small bump in the sidewalk, causing the slurpee container to bounce out of my drink holder. Surveying the damage, I discovered that the slurpee lid had broken off of the container, and the crayfish were taking their newfound liberty in stride. The crayfish began to crawl into the uncut grass that bordered the path. I only managed to catch a handful of the fugitives. The rest I can only hope made their ways back into the river.

Journeying down memory lane, I can remember my first crayfishing expedition. I had met Bertrand Parcells to go biking one summer day, but we could not think of an appropirate route. We decided instead to go fishing; yet neither of us had a fishing pole at the time.

We did, however, have old sneakers and a few hours to spend, and so we biked down to the river and began turning up rocks. I can't remember how many crayfish we caught. Perhaps we caught four; perhaps we caught five; such details are trivial. What is not trivial is that the experience forever hooked me (har!) on crayfishing. Bertrand went on to pursue other goals, namely shorteneing his first name, getting his driving license, and learning how to be a painter.