All of a sudden, I felt like I was fighting for my life. 

The gentle tugging on the line that gradually became more insistent... and that I’d come expect, didn’t happen.  One minute I was day-dreaming and contemplating the continuing conversation we were having there at the back end of the boat… and the next minute the Captain was grabbing at me as his pole nearly flew out of my hands.   My best friend was yelling something at me on my right.  The guy that worked with us, who had invited us on this Alaskan fishing trip to begin with, was busily getting his line out of the water on my left.    

The Captain’s words came through in snatches.  We’d been catching fish routinely throughout the morning, and I’d already caught more than my fair share… but I’d not felt anything like this.   

 “…. make the pole do the work…”

“.… harness … weight line….”

“.… might … halibut…”  

I could not listen to him.  At the time it didn’t occur to me that I should be listening to him.  I was literally under siege. The realization that I was going to have to bring this entity up and out of the water was instantly overwhelming.  What hit me so strongly was that this dead weight was completely alive and probably pissed!  It was pulling and jerking in ways that the prior fish hadn’t done.  Not even close.   

Ok… a bit of a confession is in order.  I am not a fisherman.  I take direction fairly well, but this trip sounded like a great experience and a much needed get-away.  Prior to this I’d been deep sea fishing perhaps twice in my life.    

This time, I didn’t know if I’d caught something or if something had caught me! 

To make matters worse, the more experienced fishermen in the group, (which was everyone) were having a wonderful time at my expense.  When they observed the nature of my struggle, rather than help me… they either shouted words of encouragement, or they laughed at me, or both.   

The Captain had properly sized me up earlier, and I would later learn that he had given me a far stronger weight line.  It was damn near piano wire.   It was the kind of thing that required little skill in preventing the line from snapping, but you still had to bring the fish up.   

You also had to outlast it.   

I started out trying to emulate what I’d seen my ship mates doing, and what I myself had done on several occasions during this trip.   Using the flexibility and strength of the pole… you leverage the fish up toward the boat… and then as you lower the tip of the fishing pole back down toward the water you reel in furiously taking up the slack as you go.  I promise you… that is what I was trying to do.   

This fish would not allow slack.  This fish did not like the idea of being pulled up at all.   I felt like I was towing a tug boat, which periodically decided to run.  Every time it felt like I was making progress, I would be rewarded by a loud “ziiiiiiiiiiiiizzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…” as the fish would simple head out further away and taking out even more line than I had reeled in.

My imagination was running away with me.  Was this really a fish or something from a bad science fiction movie?  Perhaps I had hooked an old Volkwagon bus with the skeletal remains of the driver still in it like I'd seen in an episode of Law and Order once?  Exhaustion makes your mind do strange things.   

In time, my arms began to ache.  To try and find a more comfortable way to begin pulling it up, I instinctively turned around so that the fishing pole was literally over my shoulder, enabling my back to absorb some of the work of pulling that thing up… that my arms could no longer handle.  This was rewarded by a fresh eruption of laughter from my friends and the Captain.  He was forced to admit he had never observed that particular style of fishing before. 

We fought for what felt like a half hour.  Gradually I began to see a shadow in the water… a big shadow.  Unfortunately this also meant that the fish could apparently see the source of its misery as well, because as it came closer to the boat, it fought that much harder.  By this time I was more than exhausted, and pride had no place in my world.  I asked for help… and they would not help me.   

“C’mon man you can do it” they exclaimed loudly.  “Bring it in Harp… bring it in.” 

“You can almost see it” another said looking down into the water.  “Big sucker.  You’ve already done the hard work.” 

“We want to see that over-the-shoulder move again” my friend shouted, nearly delirious with laughter. 

Finally I could see it now up near the surface.  I was amazed at its size.  The fish that I was looking at appeared to be as big as I am, and would periodically relax before going into a fresh spasm of thrashing.  People were now all calling out advice and encouragement.  In the din, I was able to sort out the Captain’s voice as he urged me to bring it closer to the side.    

With what was surely the last of my reserves I pulled the fish alongside the boat, struggling all the while to keep the tip of the fishing pole up.  Then… to my amazement, the Captain reached around me, holding my arms up and out of the way… and stuck a small sawed off shotgun over the side of the boat… and shot my fish in the head at point blank range.   

I don’t believe any of us had known that he was going to do that.  We had not yet caught anything like this, although we would catch others before the trip was over.   When questioned about it, he assured me that we did not want that fish in the boat with us if it was still alive.   It then took three of us to pull it up and into the boat with a gaffing hook. 

Regardless of my need to recover, I was thrilled.   It was a sizeable halibut and easily the biggest fish I’d ever caught.   For about an hour it was the biggest fish caught on this particular outing, but we shortly pulled up two more that were both bigger than mine.    

Booyah.