I always liked my uncle Abe Shedrofsky. He was a neat guy who drove a big truck for Consolidated Forwarding Company in Milwaukee and delivered goods and packages to businesses in the city.
He was very proud of his excellent driving record and told me he learned all the necessary skills from driving cabs and trucks when he was a young man living in Brooklyn. Yes, he had a sort of Brooklyn accent, and when he spoke Yiddish, it fit his personality. However, there were times I had to laugh to myself as he spoke it.
It was very unfortunate that my uncle Abe and auntie Bella, my mother’s sister, didn’t always get along very well. She would constantly complain about his smoking cigars and falling asleep and snoring wherever they went. I am sure he had sleep apnea, but that diagnosis was in the future. Smoking cigars didn’t help either.
I marveled how she and Uncle Abe could switch between English and Yiddish. Of course, my parents could do it also. So could my grandparents.
It was taking me fishing that was so nice of him. He would pick me up on a Friday after school and we would go to their apartment where Auntie Bella would make steak sandwiches or roast beef or even liver and onions (yuch). I would sleep with Uncle Abe in their bed, and she would sleep with my cousin Doreen in the next bedroom.
I never slept those nights. I was too excited to go fishing and besides that, Uncle Abe snored so loud that I could not sleep anyway. At 4 a.m., Auntie Bella would come into the bedroom and try to wake Uncle Abe. It was kind of fruitless. ‘ You promised to take Alan fishing.” She talked louder and louder until he finally woke up.
We dressed quickly, took our fishing gear with us and a “lunch bag” of sandwiches. He had bought me a three-section cane pole to replace the 10-foot one piece bamboo pole I used at Washington Park when Rod Eglash and I tried fishing there. I remember tying it to the frame of my bike and my dad put a red cloth on the end of it when I would bike to Rod’s house. Never caught anything. I remember that the bait of choice was a small piece of bacon, but Rod’s family was kosher so no bacon for us. While my folks did not keep kosher, they did not have bacon in the house either. Mrs. Eglash gave us some crusty bread which wasn’t very helpful for catching fish. Oh well, we always had fun anyway.
The first stop with Uncle Abe was the bait shop. I don’t know where it was because I usually fell asleep in the car on the way there. The shop was in the basement of a building with steps leading from the sidewalk into the shop. It always smelled fishy and was warm and humid inside. Uncle Able would bring his minnow bucket with us and the owner would scoop several dozen minnows into the bucket while they chatted about the weather and fishing stories. Uncle Abe would take out of his pocket a beat-up old leather coin purse and carefully pay the man and off we would go.
“Uncle Abe, is it OK to use minnows for bait? Doesn’t it hurt to be on a hook?”
“No, that is why God made minnows, and they don’t feel pain, only pressure.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely.”
Our next stop was a cafe on North Avenue a few blocks west of Farwell and on the north side of the street. It was called Moniaches. It was the only business open all night. We walked in and Uncle Abe put his arm around me as he steered me to the counter. A waitress appeared with menus. He said that we didn’t need them. ‘This is my nephew and we are goin’ fishin’ so he needs a stack of pancakes and two eggs sunny side up and a glass of milk.” (I must have told him at one time what I really loved for breakfast.} She smiled. He ordered a stack for himself, two eggs over easy, and a cup of black coffee. I was mesmerized watching intently as the cook at the griddle made our breakfast.
“How does he know just how to get all this food to be done at the same time?”
“Practice, practice, practice. Like you ought to be doing more with your trumpet.”
The food appeared and we dug in. Oh my, I remember the taste of the pancakes, the butter and maple syrup I poured over them and the great eggs. Once, Uncle Abe reached over and wiped my face from all the eggs, syrup, butter, and pancakes. He quietly ate his and when we were finished, he pulled out his coin purse again, paid the bill and left a generous tip.
“Uncle Abe, I don’t have any money to pay for my breakfast.”
That’s OK kid, you can pay me back when you grow up and get rich.”
We drove to the lakefront and either fished at the government pier or behind the Northwestern Railroad depot. The depot is long gone. The pier was long and made up of many pieces of gigantic stone which made walking on it scary for me. Uncle Abe told me to walk slowly and watch my step. “If you fall in, I can’t save you because the current is too strong, and I can’t swim.” However, the land behind the Depot had pilings sunk into the ground that we sat behind and was much safer, so we tended to go there.
We unpacked our gear and began to fish. Uncle Abe reminded me of his five most important rules of fishing. Every time we went fishing, he repeated them to me. It felt Jewish:
- If someone is catching fish and you are not, do not go as close to them as possible to try and horn in on their good fishing spot. Good fishing spots change all the time. Jewish philosophy?
- While we don’t depend on the fish we catch for our food, other folks do. Be fair to others. A good way to be Jewish.
- When we are ready to leave and have bait left over, take it to a neighbor fishing and offer it, but for free. No money for it. A Jewish thing?
- If you only catch a few, maybe you want to offer them to another person fishing. Another Jewish thing?
- Learn to have patience. Enjoy your time fishing whether you catch fish or not. There is always another time for fishing. Definitely a Jewish thing.
At about 10 a.m., Uncle Abe would ceremoniously open our “lunch bag” and take out one sandwich for me and one for him. It was usually a cheese sandwich and a bologna one. We would have grapes, apple, peach and water in a thermos bottle. He would pull out cookies for us both and we would enjoy eating, talking and fishing. I remember it well.
By noon we were ready to leave. We had eight or nine large size perch on our two stringers, and Uncle Abe would take our minnow bucket to the next group fishing and give them the leftover bait. We folded the chairs and pushed them back into the trunk of his blue Nash sedan along with the rest of the gear. He told me to check our spot to make sure we didn’t leave anything behind and certainly no trash left there. As we drove off, I opened the window on the passenger’s side and felt the warm humid air on my face. It felt wonderful.
By the time we got to our house, I had fallen asleep, and when I woke, Uncle Abe was taking his fish off his stringer and putting them on mine. I asked why he was doing it. He smiled and said that Auntie Bella really didn’t like perch and besides, now there was enough for a family fish fry at home. I asked if he wanted to stay and eat with us. No, he just wanted to get home and take a nap. He added, “Oh, you can pay me back when you are rich and famous.” Of course, that never happened. Unfortunately, Uncle Abe died a few years later when I was a teenager, and I lost my loving fishing friend.
I remember always finding it interesting that while he was in no way observant, there was a theme of what seemed to me to be Jewish values in his life. One time he took off his shirt to get the sun on him and I noticed a beautiful Mogen David around his neck. He saw me looking and told me it belonged to his father, and he got it when his father passed away.
“Do you like to wear it?”
“Of course.”
“What schul do you belong to?”
“I don’t belong to any.”
“Why not?”
“Because they are too expensive and besides, I don’t need them.”
“Why don’t you need it? We belong to Congregation Anshe Sfard.”
“That is because your grandfather and father are big machers there. Oh, Alan, someday you will understand.”
I stopped asking questions.
With Uncle Abe’s passing when I was a teenager, the responsibilities of making the funeral arrangements fell to my dad. It seemed to me that was just the way things worked out. The plans went well until he realized that no rabbi he contacted was willing to officiate at the funeral because Uncle Abe belonged to no schul and none of the rabbis even knew him. Luckily, dad’s dear friend, Sam Bloom, recommended a young rabbi from Wilmette, Illinois, who agreed to officiate — if he could speak to the family so he would “know” Uncle Abe. After talking with auntie Bella and my cousin Doreen, he stopped at our house and met with us. I said little until the stories he heard about taking first my brother David and then me fishing. I mentioned Uncle Abe’s rules of fishing and repeated them. The rabbi’s eyes lit up. He asked me to repeat them and took some notes. “Do you mind if I use them in his eulogy? I wonder if he was aware that his rules of fishing parallel some of our deepest Jewish values in life: honor, truth, and justice.” I was surprised and pleased, because Uncle Abe was always such a mensch to me.
After the service at the funeral home, my dad mentioned that this young rabbi who never met Uncle Abe had described him so well and did a tremendous job in doing so. He also liked how he had described Uncle Abe’s rules of fishing as a metaphor for many of our Jewish values as it related to our interactions with other people.
I remember that shortly after, Auntie Bella gave me Uncle Abe’s fishing gear, tackle box, and his coin purse. I eventually sent the tackle box and gear to Florida for Kathy’s brother, Bill Adams, and his kids, but have the coin purse to this day. I will probably send that to one of our sons.
Musings
I remember that with the passing of Uncle Abe, my keen interest in fishing seemed to rapidly dwindle. I can sense now that it really wasn’t the fishing I liked so much, but the camaraderie and kinship with him that I missed. Rod and I occasionally fished but not often, and he seemed to not enjoy it as much as we did in the past. My enthusiasm with Uncle Abe no longer was part of the routine with Rod, and so we moved on to other interests.
I also realized that Uncle Abe’s fishing rules were not his alone. Other anglers also had similar rules of fishing; he told me that it is often difficult to get a person to change their mind about something when they do not want to change it! And so, as time drifted, like a sweet cloud drifting across a bright blue sky, I began to understand and then accept the reality that the rules were not his in toto. By this time in my life, it was not just OK, but part of growing up….
Yes, Kathy and I eventually took Haran and Matthew fishing. With their horror of baiting a hook with a nightcrawler, both boys decided that fishing was not for them. And that was just fine with us. I donated my old three-section cane pole to Family Sharing here in Ozaukee County. I believe that what I retained were the rules of fishing taught to me so many years ago by Uncle Abe, for I learned that they apply to life itself, not just to fishing. Maybe that is why he repeated them so many times. It seems to me that Uncle Abe’s rules were part of a Jewish moral code that helps define our relationships and interactions with others.
I realize that many people seem to pick and choose how, when, and if they will express their being Jewish. Uncle Abe seemed to find his. There are times I continue to struggle to find mine.
Thanks, Uncle Abe. I hope you found lots of cigars in heaven.
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