Bahamian Personal Insight

By Jim Dickens 03/20/2024

“Who are you? Who? Who? Who? Who?”  Pete Townsend 1978

I live a safe and comfortable life as many Americans do .  That makes it much easier to be responsible, accountable, and all those other things we say about people of high character.   My dad used to say, “Well don’t tempt an honest man.”  Meaning it’s easy to be honest when you aren’t cold, starving or threatened so don’t cause another to be in that situation.  You might not get the result you want.  I went to the Bahamas in March and found myself in such a situation.

Pete, the greatest fly fisherman I have met, invited me to come stay with him for a few days on Green Turtle Cay, Bahamas to fly fish for mostly bone fish.  Bone fish use camouflage and speed to get away from sharks and barracuda.   When you hook a bone fish, the speed at which they rip out your line off your reel is thrilling.  It makes it a highly sought after catch.  Of course Pete, spending the last 25 months of March on Green Turtle, is expert at finding and catching them.  I have loved learning from him and chasing these exciting fish for the past 4 March’s.

Pete and I were catching bone fish on a Coco Bay flat in the afternoon when the current changed.   Sand from a dredge digging a channel to a boat dock started making the knee deep water murky.  We lost the school of bone fish we were chasing.  Suddenly,  Pete yelled, ”Shark, Jim a shark!”.  It was a high stress moment for Pete and especially for me.  I have a phobia regarding sharks.

To my amazement,  I found my cowardly self heading towards Pete to help him out.  And I watched Pete remain calm, again to my amazement.  As I walked toward him, Pete spun his rod around and jammed the rod butt at the charging bull shark.  He then kept poking the shark as it circled around him.  The shark swam away, and Pete and I exited the murky water.

The significance for me was I actually acted like a good friend when it wasn’t easy.  An honest man was tempted and stayed honest.  It made me really happy.  As I mentioned,  Pete is a fly fisherman without peer and he has also been very kind to me over the years. It felt good for a moment to treat him as he deserved. Of course, after the shark swam away I beat him to shore.

Pete out fished me two to one and I learned a lot.  In our comfortable lives once in a while it’s good to have moments when we find out who we really are.