The Ice Fish

Many years ago, I lived on Roberds Lake, four miles outside of Faribault, Minnesota. I invited my younger sister and brother, Bonnie and Bruce, to come for a visit. It was mid-November, and we hadn’t had much snow yet, but the lake had frozen, and the ice was about four inches thick. Shortly after they arrived, we pulled on our ice skates, and wobbled down to the shoreline.

We sat down on the rocks at the lake’s edge, removed our skate guards, and launched ourselves onto the slick glassy ice. It was as smooth as if a Zamboni machine had uniformly evened the entire surface. It was truly a wonder!

The overcast afternoon kept the sun from reflecting on the ice, and promised snow within a few hours. We skated around a bend along the shoreline, and spied an underwater spring, which bubbled up through the ice forming an ever-changing ice sculpture that grew as we stood there. We kept our distance so as not to crash though the ice in such frigid weather.

On the way back from around the bend, we noticed something, which we had not noticed before. It must have been the light of the afternoon as we skated east, but I’m not certain. There beneath our feet and under clear see-through ice, we viewed hundreds of fish swimming near the surface! We could see their tails wiggling and fins moving as they reacted to the ice skate blades scraping on the surface. We watched them with astonishment and felt mesmerized by them. They were so close to us that we could see their eyes darting around looking for what caused the sound to reverberate through the water. It was the eeriest sensation to scrutinize the fish right beneath our feet!

After hours of gazing at the uncanny sight, our feet became cold, and we retreated to the inside to thaw them next to a blazing fire. We chowed down on homemade oatmeal-raisin cookies and warmed our innards with hot chocolate, as we chattered animatedly about the afternoon. We couldn’t wait to get back out there the next day.

Overnight, the crispness in the air encouraged the grey skies to dump six inches of snow on the landscape. The next morning, we hurried down to the lake in our snow boots, and tried to remain upright, despite the slippery surface, as we shoveled an area for an ice rink. The first flakes of snow had attached themselves to the surface of the ice, which caused it to become bumpy and opaque. We could no longer peer through the ice at the fish anomaly like the day before.

The memory of that afternoon remains frozen in my brain, and I will never forget it. I hadn’t lived on the lake very long, so I expected that I would see the same uncanny sight each year when the ice froze, but it never happened again while I lived there. I still revel with amazement at the fish that afternoon, but realize now how rare and precious the moments of our lives are as they become distant memories.