Читать книгу Never Cry Halibut. and Other Alaska Hunting and Fishing Tales онлайн

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As I grew older and was looking for work, I’d put on a wool sweater, wander the docks, and talk, with a hint of an accent, to commercial fishing captains. One would hire me, thinking they were getting a Norwegian secret weapon as a deckhand. Being of Scandinavian descent and not a good fisherman was nearly unheard of. A day or so later, when we’d be far away from port and the price of diesel didn’t warrant a return trip, I would confess to being French, which was a quarter true.

“French! Why, if I would have known!” This would be followed by a long soliloquy cursing baguettes, black turtlenecks, and berets. I would threaten to go on strike, but this only excited my captains further. In time, most began to somewhat affectionately call me Jonah and only shook their heads and grumbled when I made a mistake or the fishing was poor. If they knew I was mostly Scandinavian, my health would have suffered for it.

“You look like a bobblehead. You have to be Norwegian!” one skipper said excitedly after he shook my hand and welcomed me aboard his boat. We were crabbing that summer, and I quickly became adept at birding, telling the captain how to stack pots, and making watercolor paintings of him cursing against beautiful backdrops of mountains and ocean. When he asked for a hand, I would tell him I had an acute shellfish allergy.