The daily Astorian., September 17, 2015, Image 14

OH NOBLE
Coastal Life
Story and photos by DAVID CAMPICHE
SALMON! H
Photo by David Campiche
Dawn on the mighty Columbia River.
Submitted photo
Photo by David Campiche
Coast Weekend contributor David Campiche holds his 35-pound
Chinook salmon.
Jeff Campiche holds a large Chinook salmon on the docks in Ilwa-
co, Washington.
4 | September 17, 2015 | coastweekend.com
ighlighting a big chrome head are two
enormous eyeballs that remind me of
glass shooters we kids shot into a dirt
ring. Those big eyes and stout griz-
zly-like head guide a sleek sculpted
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come, oh holy salmon!
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September. The river — our Columbia River (roll
on oh mighty Columbia) — runs fast and sleek, just
like the Chinook salmon. On its mirrored blue and
silver surface — isn’t this really just skin on a liquid
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which, in my case, has been front and center for
nearly all my adult memory, a friend, a solace, a
moody force as predictable as wind and tide can be.
Perhaps it has a heart, for the body seems to
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pumping from chamber to chamber, ventricle to
atrium, and then down all those narrow passage-
ways. Pulsing, pulsing, pulsing. The life blood of
what? Our heart? Our minds? Our memories and
our ancestors’ memories? The sustainer of life,
body and soul.
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on those same currents, head turned into the tide,
guided by a broad fan tail. Flood in, ebb out, and
always feeding. The buck or the hen feeding rapa-
ciously, storing up body fat, so that they may, when
river conditions are perfect, detect a tiny signal.
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plate.
Of course, there are no crowds yammering and
hammering and stomping, yelling their lungs dry.
Understand, for the salmon, the return to home base
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with ominous obstacles — such as my brother and
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on the enormous ocean several miles at sea and
running directly west of the mouth of the Columbia
River Bar.
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like baiting herring and untangling lines or, as on
one recent occasion, of properly netting a huge Chi-
nook salmon.
Not so my little brother, a junior by three remote
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nesse, leading the salmon to the net and ultimately,
into our kitchen.
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ly what, is devotion and holiness to the salmon all
about? You, my faithful readers will naturally ask,
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small bit of history.
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entire culture centered around this swimmer. Salm-
on was more than a mainstay. Salmon was surviv-
al. Salmon was sustenance. Salmon was a totem, a
sacred being that returned after four years from the
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cleaned, dried and prepared, often by smoking.
Laid in cedar baskets and covered with oolichan
grease, for preservation, in preparation for the dark
winter months when bellies were tight and the ber-
ries gone. Then — yes, they were patient — the pre-
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proud capable people , the Kwakiutl, Tsimshian,
Chinook and Haida ate and laughed and sang and
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content people, the People of the Salmon.
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and 25-pound line races out, the small clicker on the
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that seem a contradiction to the holiness of the mo-
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largest body of liquid on our planet and probably in
our solar system.
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than ours. The salmon could care less of being pre-
pared lovingly for service before an adoring crowd,
or friends, family, and in somebody’s cast iron
skillet. She, carrying three pounds of tangerine-or-
ange eggs, wishes to lay and propagate. Propagate
those tiny smolts or fry of which 3 percent might
return in three or four years to, yes, to this very spot
(salmon have an internal sophisticated GPS) on this
same river, and even on the same branch of the soft
moving water that sings sweet songs to the salmon.
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throws the hook? Certainly, this happens, and fre-
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She doesn‘t, as the photo in this column will at-
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sustains us as it has and did for our neighbors and
ancestors over eons. Blessed oh great salmon for
thou art holy.
No, not a god, but perhaps a harbinger or gift or
a force who must love us, for like other missionar-
ies, the salmon has shared great gifts, two of which
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