Tournament opens eyes to the world of fishing
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- Date: Sun, 14 Oct 2007 18:47:57 -0400
The Virginian Pilot, VA, USA
Friday, October 12, 2007
Tournament opens eyes to the world of fishing
By Kristin Davis
Caption: Virginia Robinson, right, leads Susie Thompson onto the Nags Head pier
for the Visually Impaired Persons Fishing Tournament. JOY LEWIS | THE
VIRGINIAN-PILOT
NAGS HEAD
Rhonda Helms steps carefully over the uneven boards of the fishing pier. A man
calls hello. He takes her hand, presses a fishing rod into her palm and folds
her fingers over it.
"Straight ahead," says Sherry Campbell, a volunteer who helps guide the two
other anglers in Helms' group. "Come over to your right a little bit." A woman
offers up her bench. Helms, Virginia Robinson and Susie Thompson take a seat
but must get up when they realize it faces directly into the sun.
The women are three of more than 500 competing in an Outer Banks fishing
tournament for the visually impaired.
The sun is bad for their eyes. They gather their bags and canes and take a seat
at the end of the pier instead, backs to the glare this time, and wait for bait
- a slimy glob of blood worms.
This is Helms' first visit to the Outer Banks. It's her first time with a rod,
and soon she hopes to catch her very first fish.
She is 36 years old.
More than 500 people fished from piers and boats on the Outer Banks in the
Visually Impaired Persons Fishing Tournament this week. They visited local
tourist attractions, listened to live music and attended courses that could
help them better cope with their disabilities.
It's part of an annual event begun by local Lions Clubs 25 years ago at the
Nags Head pier, where Helms and others fished Tuesday. It was a small event
then, but has since turned into a four-day event that takes hundreds of
volunteers and thousands of dollars' worth of donations to pull off. Folks fish
from four piers and two boats from Kitty Hawk to Avon. Hotels and motels offer
discounted rooms.
For some, the fishing tournament is like a family reunion. For others, it is
their first real trip away from home.
It's just after the 10 a.m. start time Tuesday, and Campbell's husband, Cecil,
who is also a volunteer, pushes a bloodworm onto a hook and casts it. He puts
the rod into Helms' hands, placing one of them over the line. She stands inches
from the rough and worn pier rail and waits for a pull.
A dog barks. Gulls call. There's a faint flutter of a bird's wings and the
far-off static of waves hitting the shore and the whistle of the wind on a taut
line. The air smells a little bit like salt and fish and, every once in a
while, a cigarette.
Helms waits. Wonders if she feels something. Asks for a diet root beer when a
guy with a cooler offers, then gets someone to pop the top so she can hang on
to the rod.
Helms has a rare eye disease called retinitis pigmentosa that has left her with
no peripheral vision. She was born with it but did not know anything was wrong
until one day in her 20s, when she couldn't make out a label in a grocery store.
She got three opinions.
There were no support groups for the blind near her Florida home, Helms said,
"no one to come visit, to call on the phone." She fell into a depression she
still battles.
But things changed when she moved to North Carolina in 2005. She befriended a
woman who worked with the blind, and it was she who signed Helms up for the
fishing tournament.
On Sunday morning, Helms boarded a big, comfortable charter bus near her
Hickory home and rode for six hours.
Robinson, 84, was on that bus for the fourth year in a row; Thompson, 81, for
the second time. Robinson has macular degeneration. Thompson was born without
vision in her right eye, and these days has nearly no sight in her left.
They checked into rooms Sunday afternoon. On Monday, they toured Wright
Brothers National Memorial, where a man gave them a quick history lesson. They
ate barbecue at the Manteo Lions Club at Wescott Park that night.
Most meals are served for free in the old gymnasium, where big tables fill
almost all the space. This is where the tournament awards were handed out
Wednesday night, where the World's Greatest Fishing Band played tunes such as
"Papa Was a Fishin' Man" on Tuesday and where Helms danced to Chuck Berry on
Monday.
She is saying how much she loves dancing and music - "It's the one thing that
can make me happy more than anything else" - when she feels a tug.
"Oh, I've got something," she says, her voice rising. "Can you see it? Cecil,
I've got something." It's pulling hard. It feels heavy. She reels until the
weight lifts all of a sudden. Campbell pulls it in, takes it off the hook.
Helms smiles.
The fish goes into a bag, which is looped over her wrist. The fish jerks around
inside the bag, which feels surprisingly light. It felt so big, she says.
She is still smiling.
The fishing is steady after that. Robinson nabs one next. She sings in a voice
that is Southern and teasing and the tiniest bit raspy: "I've got one fish, I
thank you. I want two, please." A teenage volunteer asks if she wants to touch
it.
"Uh-uh," Robinson says
matter-of-factly. She does not necessarily want it in a bag around her arm,
either. "You don't think it's going to jump up on my arm? I don't want it to
jump up on my arm."
Sherry Campbell laughs. "No, he's gonna flip and flop, and then he's gonna
die," she answers.
It flips and flops. Robinson orders it to be still. After a few moments, it is.
She gets another one and then another. So do Helms and Thompson. Robinson walks
over to Helms. Leans in really close. Whispers, "I bet you didn't catch as many
as I've got."
Helms does not smile.
The competition is on.
Kristin Davis, (252) 441-1623, kristin.davis@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://content.hamptonroads.com/story.cfm?story=134497&ran=185971
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