A Day Full of Life Lessons

My brother and I take some sort of fishing trip every year. We've done Florida/Texas but this year we decided to try our luck in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Gloucester is an amazing seaside town, that was settled in the 1600s and still holds onto that history today. The town was the backdrop for the movie A Perfect Storm featuring George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg.

My brother and I had been out the day before closer to shore catching stripers. That was an amazing experience and something we had always wanted to do, but when we got back to the hotel I looked at him and said, "We're up here, and I will always kick myself if we don't at least go after a bluefin tuna." He agreed, so around 3pm we started to frantically make calls. When we called our captain from that day he arranged for his son Kellen to take us out. Kellen O'Maley and his mate John had lobster'd all day in 90 degree heat. They were worn out, but they turned the boat for us and iced it down. We were going to leave at 4am.

Life Lesson #1 - If you want it, go get it. You get one chance in a lot of cases, go get it done or find a way to get it done. If you want something bad enough, freaking do it.

We got to the dock at 4am, Kellen and John were on time and both of them were in amazing spirits. These two guys are two of the hardest workers I've ever met. There wasn't any idle time, always moving, always being productive, and constantly teaching my brother and I on the proper way to do things. They did all this while maintaining a high degree of humility and patience.

Life Lesson #2 - If you are good at something, have the patience and humility to share the knowledge. I fail in the patience department more times than not. I forget where this quote comes from but when you are at the pinnacle of something, it is your job to send the elevator down.

When you get out to the fishing area, you begin to jig for bait, mainly mackerel, haddock, and pollock. We were using what was available to the tuna to eat and doing the work necessary to prepare ourselves for success. It's a repetitive thing, drop the spin caster 150 feet, reel up, take the fish off and then repeat.

Life Lesson #3 - Repetition, practice and training over and over again leads to success. "I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times." - Bruce Lee Put in the work, reap the rewards.

We had the bait, we had the everything set up, now it was time to wait, and wait and wait. We never lost the hope and were still having fun even though we were waiting. We were surrounded by natural beauty, the occasional rain shower. There were whale boats and two seals who payed us visits, life was good even though the fish weren't biting. Kellen and John told us exactly what to do if something did happen. We were ready.

Life Lesson #4 - Enjoy the ride. Even if it doesn't feel like things are happening, they still are. Tides shift, the current moves and sometimes uneventful periods are the build up to something great.

We watched whales and seals and did some drop for bait fishing occasionally. We listened to stories from Kellen and John, listened to great music. We had about 30 minutes left when all hell broke loose One of the rods just hammered and like a switch Kellen and John jumped into action, and we did exactly as they had planned for. My brother and I got the other lines in, the hook was set, the rod was in and we would be fighting this fish for a while. I asked Kellen, how big is this fish and he said, "This is a big one."

Life Lesson#5 - When you are prepared for what's next, everything becomes easier. We knew exactly what we were supposed to do. Now it was time to reel this guy in.

Kellen looked at me after the initial back and forth and said, "Now this is a game of inches, when that rod straightens out, you reel your ass off." Holy crap much easier said than done, and he was right, this was hard work. My brother and I rotated back and forth for the next 30 minutes and we got the flash. We saw this monster, and he took off again to 160 feet down.

Life Lesson #6 - Success is fleeting. Just when you think you are there, something happens, the carpet gets pulled out. It's time to go back to work.

My brother and I kept putting in the work and got the fish to the surface, and Kellen and John worked their magic with the harpoon and the tail rope. We did it, it was a bucket list Bluefin Tuna that ended up being 96" around 500 pounds. We got the fish on board, turned on Led Zeppelin and hammered it all the way back to Gloucester.

Life Lesson #7 - It takes a group of people willing to teach and learn to win. My brother and I can't thank Kellen and John enough. These guys worked their tails off and did so without complaining. They told us what to do, how to do it, and gave constant feedback on what not to do.

I had a number of friends tell me, sushi time, but the reality is that it was too big to keep and we had to sell it commercially. So to whomever is enjoying our fish, cheers to you. I get to take away a life of memories with my best friend, and a ton of life lessons that I learned in one day with some great leaders.