New theories are beginning to emerge about the origin
of man. There is evidence that rather than evolving from the apes,
we sprung from a different path. A watery path. According to some
boffins our ancestors crawled from the muddy soup at the edge
of land, in prehistoric times. Seals, dolphins and other sea mammals,
may be our distant cousins.
Mud and man may be inextricably linked, but the
desire to return to the mud burns brightest in the hearts of small
boys. Most small boys have their first contacts with mud, at the
bottom of puddles, on the way to and from school. From these first
contacts, progression into true mud, the sticky, evil smelling
brew that covers football fields and football players, is usually
rapid.
But for a select few the muddy path is different.
I was chosen.
I spent my pre-teen years in a small coastal settlement,
north of Christchurch, out from Kaiapoi, called Pines Beach. Pines
beach was about 3 miles from the mouth of the Waimakariri River.
At the bottom of our section ran a creek. Creek is a kind word
for this waterway. About 10 meters wide, most of its width was
choked with bulrushes. At the deepest point, the creek was about
half a meter deep, measured from the surface of the water to the
top of the mud, which was up to a meter deep.
The creek was blind. Two kilometres from our house,
a culvert held back the water. Filled by a series of drains cutting
across the shallow, low lying, former swamp, the creek drained
what was now marginal, very wet, farmland.
The mud in this creek was definitive in it’s foulness.
It was that oily, steel blue mud that insinuated itself between
the stems of the bulrushes. Disturbing the mud emitted a sulfurous
and methane based stench. At irregular intervals, large bubbles
of methane erupted from beneath the surface. If the mud contacted
skin or clothes it dried to a steely-gray poultice of cement-like
hardness. The mud may have dried, but the reeking stink still
pervaded the local area. Clothes fouled by the mud could not be
washed with other garments, the pong pervaded everything.
If I ever went near that creek again, I was going
to be thrashed within an inch of my life, according to my mother.
Mothers and mud have never been a comfortable mix.
But of course I found the creek utterly fascinating.
Wandering along its edges, I would watch for the sudden swirling
upwellings of mud caused by eels that slithered through the fetid
depths. What eels they were. Capable of pulling under, not only
the ducklings that abounded in Spring, but the duck as well. This
I had on the very best authority of our neighbour, the Carpenter.
He said he had heard that someone, he could not remember who,
but that someone was very reliable, had seen an eel grab a sheep
having a drink, by the ear, and drag it into, and under, the mud.
The sheep was never seen again.
I believed our neighbour. Anybody who could get
away with saying, "I’m so bloody hungry, my gut feels like
my friggin throats been cut," in front of my mother, and
not get a belt round the ear, deserved the respect of a small
boy.
I resolved to catch one of these eels. Pocket money
saved, I bought a stout hand line. Out went the line loaded with
a piece of rotting meat. For hours, I watched the line. Nothing
stirred. I pulled in the line to inspect the bait, it was still
there. Out went the line, again. Nothing stirred. Darkness started
to invade. I tied the line to the base of an overhanging willow
tree, and headed home for dinner.
Next morning I rushed down to inspect the line.
It still hung in the water. I pulled it up, and nothing, nothing
at all. No bait, no hook, no sinker. I returned home with the
line. Dad could not believe it. While he was no Arnold Swarchzenagger,
he was strong, but he could not break the line.
On the way home from school that afternoon I invested
in a new packet of hooks and some sinkers. That night, the line
re-baited, Dad, myself and the torch, settled in to wait. An hour
later saw Dad head for home, muttering something about wet grass
and piles. I did not have a clue what he was on about. What did
wet grass have to do with the things supporting the bridge across
the Waimakariri? An hour or so later, it may have been sooner,
I headed home for bed. My departure had something to do with the
sounds of night, and strange muffled splashes amongst the bulrushes.
The thing that sealed my departure however was the ‘baaaa’ of
a sheep. It seemed to come from within the bulrushes.
The line inspection next morning, revealed the same
result as the previous morning. The Carpenter, who had joined
the hunt, declared that there was "not going to be anymore
ponse ass friggin around with this (don’t you use that word in
front of the boy, said Dad) eel."
That night a length of quarter inch cord, tied to
a small shark hook, and baited, was tied to the same willow tree.
A rainy night tested our resolve, and won. The morning line inspection
revealed no line. None at all. The 15cm thick branch the line
had been attached to had been snapped off.
"Holy (I thought we couldn’t use that word
in front of the boy, said the Carpenter) Hell’, said my Father.
"Bloody hell," said the carpenter, "this
thing could pull the mortgage off my house. But we’ll fix the
bastard. I’ll bring home some really strong cord."
Trouble was my close companion at school that day.
The anticipation of the eel hunt to come, pushed school work,
and the teacher, well into the background. After school, I raced
home, and spent two very long hours waiting for Dad and the Carpenter.
That evening a length of three quarter inch rope, a one meter
length of 200kg nylon to the hook, a large piece of lamb, fired
out into the water. We sat down to wait.
An hour or so after dark the line twitched, and
twitched again. Suddenly, the line pulled sharply. I grabbed the
line, Dad and the Carpenter were diverted by a deep discussion
about Saturday’s Rugby Test, and pulled. I gained about 2 meters.
The line shot back into the water much faster that it had come
out. I hung on, and on, right into the water and mud. The merits
of the opposing forward packs, and the fortifying libations that
seemed to always accompany such discussions, became a secondary
issue.
The Carpenter bolted down to the creek edge, failed
to apply sufficient brakes, and slid into the mud. I still had
hold of the line, midway between fish and the knot at the tree.
Suddenly, the fish took a right hand turn. I was pulled down under
the mud. I let go. Then I felt something between my legs. I thought
it was the carpenters leg, but on reaching the surface, the light
from the torch held by Dad revealed the Carpenter some yards down
the creek.
I screamed. Dad yelled. The carpenter said that
word he was not allowed to say in front of the boy, several times.
The line broke with a rifle shot like crack.
All that noise was quiet in comparison to the noise
Mum made when I was deposited outside the back door. It was nearly
as much noise as the Carpenters wife was making next door. It
was the first time I had ever heard a woman use that word that
adults were not allowed to use in front of the boy.
First I was hosed down, clothes and all. My clothes
were removed, and I was hosed down again. Then it was under the
shower, twice, then into a bath thick with disinfectant. Despite
all of this my bed sheets held the odour of mud for months afterward.
Dad, the Carpenter and I made clandestine plans to get that (don’t
use that word in front of the boy) eel, once and for all.
All the planning was for naught. Two days after
my dunking, the dragliner moved in. It scooped out the mud, the
bulrushes, and hundreds of eels. They could be seen falling from
the bucket of the dragliner. Some wriggled from the mud deposited
on the bank and slithered back into the water. Others died as
they slithered the wrong way. Eels and bulrushes, were not the
only items that came out of the creek. Bicycle frames, car tyres,
old fuel drums, were all deposited on the bank.
By the willow tree, I found a sheepskin, the skull
still attached, minus one ear. It is probably coincidence, but
I never fished for eels in the creek again. My relationship with
my mother took a distinct turn for the better, and a new legend
was born.