As a 5 to 7-year-old kid (which were the years I spent fishing with grandpa or just talking about fishing with him), I wanted to catch a fish every time my bait hit the water while not understanding how unrealistic that was. Grandpa told me more than once that “patience is the best bait” meaning that there are more times that you have to wait to catch a fish then you are actually catching fish. It took me a while to understand this but I finally did and now, 60 years later, it is still the truth.
Today was a prime example. I usually don’t fish on the weekends due to the tourist crowding the pier and I especially don’t fish on holiday weekends like this one, but I was feeling very restless so I threw caution to the wind and went to the Ventura Pier. I got there later than I usually do and I was shocked to see how many people were out fishing today. There were more anglers than tourists.
Still, I went out to one of my favorite spots and found it open. After two hours of no fish, though, I was ready to go in and take a rare shut out home with me. Then I remembered what grandpa told me and instead of going in, I moved further out on the pier to the deeper end of it. In about 20 minutes, I caught three large Mackerel and my Wishing Pole started getting a lot of attention.
Outside of catching a $*@! # bait stealer, my Wishing Pole was very quiet despite getting that attention. However, I wound up catching seven Mackerel on my ultra-light Fishing Pole not counting two that wriggled off the hook half way to the pier.
Seven fish in about an hour and half made today a good day but it would have never happened had not grandpa cautioned me about impatience all those decades past.
The Old Man & The Seas 
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