The holidays are over. Everything went well for us. I hope you can say the same. They were busy up here, though.
All four of the kids were here at the house for Christmas morning. That’s the first time for our family and I have to say it was great. We opened presents, sat around and just generally enjoyed ourselves for a few days.
Santa was good to everyone. He got good (accurate) behavior reports on the kids and on Becky so they didn’t have any problems. In my case he didn’t hear about anything bad — I sweat that every year, you know — so I made out pretty good, too.
We did have a little drama with Vegas and Estella. Vegas caught a cold and, as kids are prone to do, gave it to his little sister. That wouldn’t be noteworthy except that she kept getting sick and her breathing became really labored. Becky took her to the hospital right up the road. They didn’t have a pediatrician there so she finally had to take her to another hospital. Everything worked out after that. She’s fine and we’re relieved.
A lot of people don’t realize it but tiny babies — Estella is only three months old — are very different than kids and adults. Their bodies aren’t fully developed so things that don’t amount to much with us can be life-threatening with them. It only makes sense to get on top of things right away.
It’s scary with little babies. It really is. They’re so small they can’t tell you what’s wrong but you know something is because it’s obvious they’re in pain. Your heart breaks for them. You want to help them, and would do anything for them, but you don’t know what to do. I’m not saying we went through anything that millions of other parents haven’t. I’m just saying it’s tough.
While all that was going on I was trying to finalize sponsor deals, get all my tackle ordered, make travel arrangements and get ready for my new boat to arrive. That’s a full-time job. I have no idea why they call this the off-season. To me it’s busier than when we’re fishing.
I mean, at least we get some downtime between tournaments and all we really have to worry about is catching fish. Believe it or not that’s less hassle and pressure than what we have in November and December. Besides, during the tournaments there’s a schedule that keeps everything in order.
You know when you have to launch and you know it’s going to happen regardless of whether things are finished or not. During the winter there’s always a few more hours that you can work on a project. The deadlines are sometimes a pain in the butt but at least they keep things moving. You know, there’s a fixed start and stop to things.
Speaking of starting and stopping, it‘s time for me to go. I’m in Florida working on some stuff for Rapala. We’ll talk some more next week.
Mike Iaconelli’s column appears weekly on Bassmaster.com. You can also find him on Facebook and Twitter.
