Text by Rodolfo Perri.
should place it on the chart, resort to the sextant and the compass, to encourage me to place it. It is that little piece of water that is in front of the NW angle of the tide gauge of the Buenos Aires Fishermen’s Club, that corner where the deanery of fishermen of that institution found refuge, today already consecrated as a historical monument of the city. But I prefer, and it is better, to talk about him as is customary in canophile circles, fed by anecdotes that are renewed every season. The exact location would be a useless task and also, even for regulars, there are no reserved places. That tiny fraction of the river coast belongs to the brotherhood, but also to the entire club. Except that, of course, those who attend almost daily have established a “right of use”, as traditionalist lawyers say, and therefore no one disputes that place even though, and it is good to clarify, they always occupy it on business days and not so on weekends.
We were precisely in front of the mentioned corner, and we agreed that there is, above all reason and calculation, an evident relationship of cause and effect in the entire tide gauge. Years go by, and customs remain. There are those who arrive, gun, launch, wait, have one or two piques and withdraw, with no other vocal emission than a greeting and farewell. There are others who are more loquacious who always develop different theories about infallible baits, unsuspected hook models, and completely new hook systems.
Today’s theme refers to identification, which is nothing other than man and the environment, the microcosm that surrounds him, and that undoubtedly attracts him fully.
Such is the case of Aguilera and her corner. The baptism of that point in our letters could not but bear her own name. I don’t expect questions about it, neither does he, I’m sure. But I know that this relationship exists and there are examples.
A certain afternoon of good pique, he found himself in front of his corner, strictly speaking, at his well, when, unexpectedly, he had to be absent for a brief period, in which other parishioners arrived. Some of them took advantage of the space and made their spears. Aguilera, who is frugal and strict in his judgments, returned, raised his rod and moved a few meters further. No problem arose; but there he reduced the fishing, until, curiously, the pike ended in the entire wharf.
If there is something that every veteran avoids, it is the dogmatic tone. I attend infinite dialogues full of improved anecdotes over and over again. But when opinions are required, which in fishing, like all atavistic heritage, are very risky so they risk error at every moment, that is when the answers are eluded. Aguilera is, in this, cautious for the others; and he never allowed the existence of a mystery transmitted only to him. His innate ability and sense of opportunity, in addition to a pedigree of fishermen, are on display on every day. He does not hide his baits, his hooks or the type of tackle he uses.
And here’s the unusual, the inexplicable: If our friend starts a session, usually in the evening, and interrupts it shortly after starting it, it’s not worth continuing with a stick in hand, at least for a long time. It can be descending, increasing or stoa; It can be with a calm wind or with shocking gusts. What is certain is that he raises the rod and retires. By simple observation, we located the area of his spears, which, on the other hand, is only ten meters inland, and we took the opportunity to occupy the site; but… hours pass, and the baits return intact.
Jokes about this man’s esoteric knowledge of the river have been around for quite some time now. Titles and praise slide down the tanned skin of “an old caneman, with years in the streets, stands and breakwaters”, as he usually says.
And now, my own explanation, or location in the topic. My seniority encourages me to weave musings. It is that the fisherman is a solitary apprentice of an inveterate loner, circumspect, taciturn to the point of melancholy. The fisherman goes to the medium that will satisfy or excite him with an imperious thirst, which is renewed every day. In the tide gauge the examples are everyday and do not attract our attention. However, for neophytes, this permanent return to that single source, to that single source of emotions, is difficult to understand. There is a secret contact, a tacit dialogue between the environment and man, between the eternity of the water and the ephemeral presence of the fisherman and his rod. Many of us prefer to let our eyes and thoughts wander through the changing sunsets of every day. We seek and obtain images and answers, while we drink comfort and peace from the river. Others, Aguilera among them, instead maintain an intense reciprocity of sensations with the unknown. Not otherwise can it be that he, at a certain moment, changes the whole team and obtains, in a futile day, conquest after conquest.
-“They sting me because they know that I put them back in the water”, once said between laughs.
I don’t think so. I maintain, instead, that in those inaccuracies, in that all possibility of the real, in which nature always chooses, plays and wins to forget its astonishment for the indeclinable human vanity, it condescendingly delivers mysteries and equations to just one. Perhaps, so that these lines can be written and we can baptize, once again, the “Pozo de Aguilera”.
by Juan Ferrari
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