Dad's Cricket Cage

I was Dad’s tomboy for a long time. My sister, who was two years younger, was not a girlie-girl necessarily; we were both outdoorsy. But I think I was more willing to join him for his activities. By the time my brother came along, I was focused on band, school, and boys.

Dad taught me how to fire his rifle. He would place cans atop fence posts at the edge of our yard, and we used them as targets. I do not think I used the gun more than a couple of times. I never truly hunted with him, but I did accompany him for squirrel hunting occasionally. My only assignment was to stay close to him and to keep quiet.

When I was little, I sat on my dad’s lap so I could “drive.” I outgrew his lap, but by age 12, he allowed me to be the sole occupant of the driver’s seat while he coached me through driving down lightly traveled gravel roads. Dad owned probably half a dozen pickup trucks over the years. Most of them were red, which was why as a teen I swore I would never buy a red vehicle. The Mazda CX-5 in my driveway proves I am a liar.

I remember many occasions when I joined Dad as his golf caddy. I was more of a golf buddy, because I could not drive the cart nor choose his clubs. But I could at least find the ones he requested. I most enjoyed using the ball washer, and I would convince him to let me use it whether or not his golf balls were dirty. Sometimes his fellow golfers would humor me, too.

Most of our one-on-one time was spent fishing. Initially, he did most of the work: baiting the hook for me, reeling in the catch, and removing the fish to determine whether it was big enough to keep in his hanging fish basket or if we needed to toss it back in the lake. If either of us snagged a carp, he mumbled, “God damn pot licker,” and hurled it back in the water regardless of size. We always favored bluegills and perch. Dad invited me to fish less often as I grew older, because while he could sit there for hours, sometimes catching little, he knew I would grow bored quickly and start asking to go home long before he was ready to stop fishing.

One way I assisted Dad, especially in preparation for his annual fishing trip to Ontario, Can., was to join him in gathering nightcrawlers to use for bait for big, tasty walleye. We typically looked for them in our back yard where we had plenty of tilled soil from our huge garden. Dad knew the best places to spot the nightcrawlers as he skimmed the ground with the flashlight. I sometimes grabbed them too aggressively and snapped the little guys in half. He was good at scooping them quickly out of the ground while I shone the light just beyond the nightcrawler where we could still see it wiggling near the edge of the lighted ground. He kept them in dirt inside coolers in the weeks before his trip.

Sometimes for his local fishing adventures, Dad would use crickets as bait. I do not recall whether he purchased the crickets, caught them, or both. He had a vintage wooden cricket cage, painted green, with mesh screen-type sides that allowed them to breathe. The top was a circular piece of wood that swiveled to open the cage. I loved the cricket cage but not necessarily because I would capture crickets. If I did, they were temporary pets, not bait. I used the cricket cage to capture grasshoppers, caterpillars, and most often, toads. When Dad needed the cage for its intended use, he often had to ask me where it was or holler at me to empty it of my captive creatures.

When I was in high school, we moved to a house that had a workshop that sat between the house and the garage. Dad loved having an indoor space for cleaning fish. I never wanted to use the filet knife, but I would join him in the workshop and assist by using a spoon to scrape off the scales. One of my regrets was that I never retained his fileting lessons. I did not want to know how to filet the fish, but he wanted to teach me. I pretended to be interested in hearing what he said, but I made no effort to remember the tips or put them into practice. I love to eat all kinds of fish, freshwater and saltwater, but I do not think I have what it takes to slice one open.

When my dad passed away, his possessions consisted mostly of tools, guns, and lots of fishing gear. The first time I returned to Mom’s house after the funeral, very few of his belongings remained. I took a striped, short-sleeved, button-up shirt that I still use occasionally as a night shirt. I also found two T-shirts. I really did not recall seeing him wear any of them, so they held no sentimental value.

I was somewhat certain I had a pair of his long johns in my dresser already. He gave them to me to wear as pajamas on a cold night when I had visited him and Mom. He told me to keep them. Several days after Dad died, after I had returned home, I found myself wondering whether the long johns I found were indeed his and not my husband’s. Then the most bizarre thing happened: my younger daughter called to tell me about a strange dream she had. She dreamed my grandpa, Dad’s father who had passed away five years earlier, had called her, which was something I am sure never happened previously. In her dream, her great-grandpa asked her whether I had been wearing my dad’s long johns. As Angela told me about her dream, before she even finished, I was in tears. I had my answer; the ones in my drawer were his.

My most prized possession from my late dad was not the thermal underwear or the night shirt or T-shirts that held no sentimental value. What I staked my claim on after he passed was his cricket cage. I do not use it; the cage sits high on a shelf as part of my décor in our sunroom. My grandkids do not have the same gumption I had when it came to capturing toads or grasshoppers. They have been known to gather snails or occasional wooly worms, but I never offered them use of the cricket cage. Memories of Dad are what I hold most dear, but the cricket cage is something I can touch, even though I usually just gaze at it from below its dusty shelf. I would give anything to hear him holler at me once more to get my “pets” out of his cricket cage.