Tele Aadsen

writer - fisherman - listener

Enough About Hooked… How are YOU?

by | Sep 29, 2012 | Alaska, Commercial Fishing, F/V Nerka, Reading & Writing, Women in Fishing | 16 comments

One hun­dred forty-nine.

That’s how many hours Cap’n J and I spent at the dock over the last 47 days of our sea­son. As if final­ly grasp­ing the fun­da­men­tal trick to mak­ing a liv­ing fish­ing – keep­ing your hooks in the water – we pushed our­selves to make the quick­est of turn­arounds this year.

As fish­er­men, this hard-charg­ing approach served us well.  As a writer, it wasn’t so good for me.

Mid­way through one of our last trips, I stood in the cock­pit wip­ing sea lice from a coho’s sup­ple body, my thoughts drift­ing like kelp torn free of the sea floor. I won­dered how Jen Pickett’s gill­net sea­son had gone, and if fall storms would trap her in Cor­do­va. What was going on for all of the Red Wheel­bar­row Writ­ers? How was Emi­ly hold­ing up, deal­ing with her mom’s Alzheimer’s? What beau­ti­ful bit of writ­ing was I miss­ing from Sift­ing the Grain, and what were Lisa W. Rosen­berg’s lat­est obser­va­tions on body image and identity?

Stand­ing in the place that makes me feel most in touch with myself and my sur­round­ings, I sud­den­ly real­ized how removed I’d become from others.

I write not only out of a desire to com­mu­ni­cate, but to con­nect. To engage in mean­ing­ful con­ver­sa­tions and forge rela­tion­ships. But all of Hooked’s sum­mer posts focused on how things were on the Ner­ka, pub­lished in a fren­zied scram­ble as we left town. (True sto­ry. More than once I clicked “pub­lish” as the dock lines were cut, cross­ing my fin­gers it would post before we lost the harbor’s ten­u­ous internet.)

Those 149 hours ashore didn’t include oppor­tu­ni­ties to respond to your com­ments, vis­it your blogs, cel­e­brate your recent suc­cess­es or wish you the best in hard­ships. Instead of the rec­i­p­ro­cal con­ver­sa­tion that’s the great beau­ty of blog­ging, I’m afraid Hooked has veered dan­ger­ous­ly close to becom­ing That Guy – the one loud­ly hold­ing court at a par­ty, dom­i­nat­ing all con­ver­sa­tion with his own self-absorbed mono­logues. No one enjoys get­ting stuck with that guy. I def­i­nite­ly don’t want Hooked to be that guy.

So, enough about Hooked. How are you? What’s your lat­est tri­umph or chal­lenge? Fel­low blog­gers, have you writ­ten a favorite post recent­ly that you’d be will­ing to link to here? Fish­er­folks, how did the sea­son treat you?  What are you doing next?

I’ve missed know­ing how you’re doing, buddies.

(Psstt…  Jen Karuza Schile, don’t you have a new e‑book to share? Proud of you for cre­at­ing a great resource for all of the shore-side heroes hold­ing fish­ing fam­i­lies togeth­er! And Robin Blue, con­grats on Nation­al Fisherman’s cov­er sto­ry on your fam­i­ly mak­ing the tran­si­tion from crew to cap­tain! Nick Rahaim, great Pacif­ic Fish­ing arti­cle on Xtra Tuf’s shod­dy sell-out to Chi­na – what are you work­ing on next?)

Also, Hooked gained some addi­tion­al read­ers recent­ly. Wel­come, new friends, and please say hel­lo if you’re so inclined. I’m glad you’re here.

16 Comments

  1. keneumey
    keneumey on September 29, 2012 at 3:44 pm

    Tele, you’re one of the most inter­ac­tive blog hosts I know! End­ing posts with a ques­tion, and respond­ing to com­menters. These are things I nev­er thought to do before I read your blog. So I guess what I’m say­ing is, Rhymes with Safari is That Guy.

    I’m glad you’re back! I think your read­ers and your face-to-face friends under­stand that your atten­tion is divid­ed for half the year. Lucky for us, the qual­i­ty of the oth­er half of the year is strong enough to keep us connected.

    • Tele
      Tele on September 30, 2012 at 11:29 pm

      Nope, sweet­ie, not so — Rhymes with Safari makes me laugh way too much to the That Guy! And thanks, but I can’t take cred­it for the con­clud­ing ques­tions — total­ly stole that one from Cami. 🙂 

      For every­one else out here (par­tic­u­lar­ly the dog lovers among you), do check out Kar­i’s blog at http://rhymeswithsafari.com/

  2. grainsifter
    grainsifter on September 29, 2012 at 7:51 pm

    You are so sweet, Tele, to men­tion my blog. You haven’t missed much. I too have been a bit absent of late, although not bat­tling wind and waves and the chal­lenges of the sea and its boun­ty as you have.

    I did the math. Put togeth­er, that’s 6 days ashore out of 47, so clear­ly no apolo­gies need­ed! I loved and looked for­ward to each and every one of your posts, and I’m sure I’m not alone in appre­ci­at­ing the way your writ­ing makes me able to close my eyes and imag­ine myself right up there on the deck with you, even though in real­i­ty that would nev­er ever hap­pen since I’m not one for cold climes and I tend to get a bit sea­sick! Wel­come back!

    • Tele
      Tele on September 30, 2012 at 11:37 pm

      I think mutu­al wel­come back wish­es are due! Hope you’ve been hav­ing a love­ly hiber­na­tion hia­tus, friend.

  3. fishingblues
    fishingblues on September 29, 2012 at 9:06 pm

    Thanks Tele! I’m hap­py to hear you are back in town and I’m look­ing for­ward to actu­al­ly meet­ing you in per­son some­time. Have fun get­ting set­tled back in and adjust­ing to the slow­er speed of things.
    ‑Robin

    • Tele
      Tele on October 1, 2012 at 11:00 am

      You’re most wel­come, Robin. I’ve been mean­ing to send you a note: when Joel and I got off the boat last week and were on our very first dri­ve home, I was star­ing out the car win­dow, tak­ing it all in, when I saw the Robin Blue! I have to admit that I squealed. She’s even more beau­ti­ful in person!

  4. Andrew
    Andrew on September 30, 2012 at 9:10 am

    You’re a great writer, and I’m glad that the trolling fleet has such a well round­ed per­son writ­ing about life as a troller. It was a ter­ri­ble sea­son, read­ing your posts made me feel a bit bet­ter that we wer­ent alone. My cap­tain and I are best freinds and we struck out by our­selves this year, build­ing our boat back from scratch. Thank you again for your words

    • Tele
      Tele on October 1, 2012 at 11:09 am

      Andrew, I’m so glad that you com­ment­ed! Thanks for your kind­ness; I’m always grate­ful to hear from fel­low fish­er­men. Bum­mer on the sea­son, but how lucky that you’ve got a good rela­tion­ship with your cap­tain. That real­ly makes all the dif­fer­ence — I worked on some boats where I bare­ly made enough to cov­er my crew license, but had such a good time that it was worth it, and oth­ers where the mon­ey was good but the com­pa­ny was too high of a cost. Glad to hear that you’ve got a good one!

      Where do you fish out of? Let me know if we’ll cross paths on the dock, and best wish­es for your off-season.

  5. Joanne Rideout
    Joanne Rideout on September 30, 2012 at 10:55 am

    Hi Tele, I’m one of those new blog read­ers. I love read­ing your posts, such a slice of life in a beau­ti­ful and chal­leng­ing part of the world. I’m in Asto­ria, Ore­gon, home of the Fish­er Poets Gath­er­ing. I have a pod­cast and radio show called The Ship Report, (www.shipreport.net) and recent­ly I talked about your “guy in the fish cool­er” post after I saw it on face­book. I read a lit­tle of your blog on the air and post­ed a link to it, Got lots of pos­i­tive respons­es from lis­ten­ers. Those of us who love mar­itime sto­ries are glad to be con­nect­ed to you! — Joanne

    • Tele
      Tele on October 1, 2012 at 11:21 am

      Joanne! Hel­lo!

      Thanks so much for intro­duc­ing your­self; I’d just checked out The Ship Report this week­end and meant to send you a note. GREAT site, sto­ries and pho­tos! (Espe­cial­ly like your smil­ing face inside the sub­mersible.) Thank you for shar­ing the fish tote sto­ry; in what seemed like inevitable tragedy, I’m glad that a broad­er audi­ence can join in the celebrating.

      I sure had an amaz­ing time in your town last Feb­ru­ary. It’d be love­ly to meet you… Maybe we can cross paths at this year’s FPG!

      Cheers -
      T

  6. goats2go
    goats2go on September 30, 2012 at 12:19 pm

    Tele, I am more and more appre­ci­at­ing your split year in my own land­lub­ber life although mine is split dur­ing each day rather than by month. I love read­ing your blog and aspire to have mine be as well writ­ten and as fre­quent­ly updat­ed. — Adrienne

  7. Tele
    Tele on October 1, 2012 at 12:37 pm

    Adri­enne, I have huge respect/awe for how you man­age your split days, and I love that goats have been your social work burn-out rem­e­dy. I’m so glad we’re still in contact! 

    (For every­one else: go meet Adri­en­ne’s unbe­liev­ably adorable herd of Amazin’ Graz­ers at http://grazingwithgoats.wordpress.com/. Between the pho­tos and Adri­en­ne’s descrip­tions, I melted.)

  8. patriciasands
    patriciasands on October 1, 2012 at 8:05 pm

    Wel­come back to land, Tele. Thanks for tak­ing us along on anoth­er sea­son at sea with you, Cap’n J and the mighty Bear!

    • Tele
      Tele on October 4, 2012 at 11:14 pm

      Many thanks, Patri­cia! How­ev­er, I feel like you very deft­ly side-stepped some ques­tions here… 🙂 

      Folks, Patri­cia is the author of the nov­el, The Bridge Club, and a remark­ably com­mu­ni­ty-mind­ed, inclu­sive blog­ger. She’s cur­rent­ly at work on her next nov­el, yet still man­ages to post & tweet reg­u­lar­ly, gen­er­ous­ly pro­mot­ing oth­er writ­ers and impor­tant caus­es like Nation­al Breast Can­cer Month. You can fol­low her blog at http://patriciasands.wordpress.com/.

  9. Lisa W. Rosenberg
    Lisa W. Rosenberg on October 9, 2012 at 8:43 am

    Hi again Tele. And a huge belat­ed thank you for this men­tion. Hav­ing two over­whelm­ing months in terms of com­mitt­ments and have been deny­ing myself the small plea­sures. I con­sid­er your beau­ti­ful blog one of these. Now I see how much I’ve been miss­ing! Glad to be back. I’ve missed you!

    And, p.s. I could nev­er see you as “that guy!”

  10. waltzingpika
    waltzingpika on October 9, 2012 at 7:24 pm

    Hi Tele,
    I’m also a new read­er. Found your blog through an ADN arti­cle about the fish­er­man res­cued in a fish tote. A com­menter gave a link to your account of the res­cue. I’m rather new at blog­ging and it has been excit­ing to find blogs by oth­er women fish­er­men in Alas­ka. ~ Molly