Funny, not Trashy
Reading the memoir Trash Fish: A Life by MSU professor Greg Keeler feels like what I imagine a day at the old muddy swim hole felt like for my mother and the other youngsters of her hometown: dirty, a little trashy, but the source of many loving memories. Keeler’s writing comes off as surprisingly laid-back for a professor of English, but just as this shock begins to wear off, he includes a little bite of enlightenment and self-analysis. Modest, funny, and a little gross, Keeler’s stories explain his life through, and sometimes despite of, his life-long fishing obsession.
[p. 44] “Have you ever been to Montana?” says the man, gazing at distant pine trees.
“No,” says Greg, “but I’ve ordered flies from Dan Bailey’s, and they’re…”
“Montana is nothing like this state with its little mud puddles and its slums of trout,” says the man. “Montana is God’s country.”
Greg tries to imagine a country that God would designate as his own, but lately he has been having trouble imagining God at all, much less his country.
-Greg Keeler, Trash Fish: A Life (Counterpoint, $14.95) IN STOCK!
