Empty Nets
The sea lapped against the side of their boats. The night had been unproductive for both vessels. Men with muscular builds and hair covered limbs hauled their nets from the water. Even empty, lifting the nets from the sea was a chore for tired arms.
"The catch is barely enough to feed my family." The speaker of the complaint was solidly built. His clothing had soaked up sea water and sweat. His day was ending with mounting frustration.
"Things will get better, Simon."
For a brief moment Simon believed his brother's passive response to their looming starvation, or more urgently, their inability to pay the tax, had some basis in reality.
"Once again, Andrew, do I have to listen to your view of our lives, wasted on fish and the call of the sea?"
"It would be possible... to be something different."
"We have been fishermen all our lives. You and I know no other trade. I cannot, overnight, become a carpenter. Neither can you. I am not a man of high learning. I cannot become a scribe. Neither could you. Perhaps you think we should sell fine cloth in the market place. Perhaps we should become shepherds."
"There are possibilities, Simon."
"You've been listening too much to that vagabond down by the Jordan."
"His name is John," Andrew said a bit defensively.
A voice shouted across the water's surface. Zebedee's boat. Young John, the youngest of Zebedee's sons called out. Simon found it interesting that the dreamer, among those fishing, carried the same moniker as the screaming lunatic standing waist deep in the Jordan.
"Anything?" John called out with hands cupping the sides of his mouth.
"A few stragglers," Andrew yelled back. "Simon is frustrated."
"Are we heading to shore?"
Andrew looked at his brother. They would wait for his decision, Andrew, James, John's older brother, and any hired workhands.
"Perhaps John could become something different," Simon said, delaying the command the others waited for. "He is young. He is not suited for this life. You, me, James, this is all we have, boats, the sea, and the fish swimming beneath the surface. I am old and tired. I will stay with my boat, my nets, and cast off another day." Simon stood and shouted to the other boat, "Head to shore, I'd rather rest my head on a stone, than cast out another net."
Zebedee's boat joined them, nets on board, limited catch in the hold. The shore would feel good beneath their tired legs.
~
They pulled their boats to shore, again straining their muscles. A frail man could never perform this type of work. One required the strength of an ox, and the brain of a fool. The thought meandered around inside Simon's head. He considered his brother, Andrew the dreamer. Andrew clustered around others who dreamt of things way beyond the mold their lives were shaped from. Andrew lacked not only knowledge, but common sense as well.
"We have a couple nets which need mending," Andrew called from the rear of their vessel.
"One more thing before I rest," Simon shouted back. This was his day, pulling nets from the water, hopefully filled with fish, eating a small portion of the catch, and resting his head for a fitful sleep. Every day, over and over, this had been his father's life, this was his life.
Simon was on the shore, finishing the last net. Andrew was back at the boat. James and John were helping their father with one of their own nets which had ruptured, due to the weight of nothing more than sea water. Sometimes he wished he could dream like his brother. That he could envision a world gentler than the one they'd carved out for themselves. Simon would have loved to play as a child again, in those days before his father brought him out on the boat. His boat now.
Simon was on his knees, rolling up his net, when the sand before him was disturbed and bathed in a shadow. At first he noticed two feet wearing tattered sandals, possibly someone looking to haul nets, brimming with a massive catch. The shadow betrayed the man as being tall and slender, not muscular at all, not built to work beside he and Andrew. He waited for the interloper to speak, but he was greeted with silence.
Simon's eyes traveled up the shape of the man casting a shadow over his work. He was, as Simon suspected, no more built for the trade than Zebedee's youngest son, John. When they met, eye to eye, Simon's voice was caught in his throat, like a fish tangled in a freshly mended net. The man before him walked out into the water and climbed onto the boat. Without a single word, the slender man, built not like a fisherman, took a seat, and briefly, Simon pondered the possibility that his life was about to change.
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