12/26/2025
I’ve been a fisherman since I was a boy.
Before I ever learned to read, I already knew how to read the sea – when it was calm, when it was angry, when it was a day to come home smiling and when it was a day to return in silence.
Today was a day of silence.
The engine worked, my hands burned on the ropes, the nets went out and came back again and again… but the boat reached the dock empty. No fish. No smell of victory, the one every fisherman recognizes when the tide helps.
From the outside, people don’t see it.
They just notice the yellow jacket, the old cap, the white beard. But inside there’s a heart doing the math: the fuel that got more expensive, the late bills, the kid who needs school supplies, the gas for cooking, tomorrow’s bread.
It’s not only fish we bring back in the boat.
We bring hope. The hope of walking into the house carrying something in our hands. And when that doesn’t happen, the mind gets heavy and the chest tightens… still, a fisherman stays standing, because he knows the sea is also made of new beginnings.
Tomorrow, before sunrise, I’ll be back at the same dock.
Maybe the tide will be kinder, maybe it won’t. But I’ll try again. This is what I know, this is how I live – taking care of the nets, the boat, and this thin line of faith that keeps pulling me back to the water.
If one day you cross paths with a fisherman whose eyes look tired, remember: behind that silence there may be a battle you know nothing about.
And if it’s not too much to ask… send him a bit of strength in your thoughts. A prayer. A kind word. Sometimes, that’s what keeps us going.
