Home Sweet Home

I don't know why but I got stuck on viewing photos on Webshots this morning of the Everglades. I'm from around that area and I remember the Everglades before it was a tourist attraction. I used to fish down there off the little flat bottom bass boat my dad left me, the backwaters filled with gators in Chokoloskee, chomp chomp.

I remember once fishing in Chokoloskee, in the middle of the night, for snook when my partner hooked something big, really big. I went for the net and flashlight only to turn and see a big white open mouth with big teeth almost in the boat (the boat sat low in the water). It was one pissed off GATOR! He burnt the line with his cigarette and the gator swam away, only to watch us from a distance. His eyes shown red in the spotlight. That was my last all night fish trip in the Everglades. I did learn one thing, when the fish AREN'T biting, a diehard "reelman" thinks (hopes) they will "turn on" any second. Heaven help you if they do finally TURN ON, you'll be there for more hours! That's why I was there, in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.

I retired my boat from fishing after the gator incident and it became a mobile tanning bed for me and my girlfriends, 'The Bass Boat Babes'. We ruled the Snook Inn in Marco Island and Keywaydeen Island near Naples. We didn't know beans about the channel markers in the water and quickly became the 'Sandbar Queens'. It's a wonder we ever survived it all. We were "Wild On" before "Wild On" was on.

Maybe I'm a little homesick for the flat lands, cypress heads, swamp buggies, and all those things I associate with "home". I can get lost in the memories the photographs of Clyde Butcher portray. He shoots black and white and I remember Clyde from WAY BACK WHEN.

There's no point to this post except to say I need to get inspired (i.e. get off my ass) and take photos of Costa Rica for those that cherish their memories here, like I cherish my memories there, in The Everglades.

(photo not mine - swiped off Webshots)
BTW: The stock market will definitely suck today so I'm off to take new photos.