Squid Stories

Speaking of Squid, which seems to be the subject for this week, I received an e-mail from Nancy Lane Long, in which she shared this childhood squid memory:

My mom, Vangie, had bought me a new fisherman sweater at Village Fair for my birthday. I think I was about 13. It was literally one of my few "boughten" sweaters, as she, like most moms, knit for pleasure and for thrift back in those days. I was thrilled. Wore it down to the docks one evening while it was still brand new. Ralph Case was fishing for squid. The squid squirt me down the front of my brand new sweater. Squid ink is indelible. Pride goeth before a fall.

(Nancy Lane Long grew up on the corner of Pease's Point Way and Davis Lane, was a couple of years behind me in school, and stumbled onto Edgartown News via a Disqus comment page. Nancy lives off-island now, but her heart remains in Edgartown. Thanks for checking in, Nancy.)

I know that calimari is considered a delicacy and is enjoyed by many (my late step-father-in-law, Sam Riccio, was a connoisseur and creator of calimari), but I will confess that after spending many a childhood summer day fishing down at the town wharf, cutting up frozen squid (on the seats, alas - what did we know, we were kids), watching it thaw, dry in the sun, and ultimately become a rotting, stinking mess, you won't find me eating it anytime soon, and the day, many years ago, when Paul was squiring me around in his classic maroon Ford Fairlane and I happened to sit on an old rotten piece of squid that had fallen off of his fishing pole onto to the passenger seat sealed the deal. This piece of errant bait was only approximately 1/2" square, but was the rotten-ist thing you ever smelled, and I think I even wore it on my backside for a short while until we figured out where the smell was coming from. Romantic, right?

But it looks like fun, catching it, and I guess I'll have to eventually take the grand kids down to the docks to give squidding a whirl, maybe even with their grandfather's old squid jigs.