ESPN Freshwater

Courtesy of Charlie MooreJacket design of Charlie Moore's book, "The Mad Fisherman: Kick Some Bass with America's Wildest TV Host," published this month by St. Martin's Press and available at major book retailers.

Sales. Fishing. Fishing. Sales.

Even without a college education, I knew that my skill at fishing combined with my natural salesmanship made opening a tackle store a natural decision. It made perfect sense ... at the time.

Of course, you need money to open a store and I didn't have anything but the money my dad gave me, which we were using to live on. But I did have a credit card — they mail those things to anyone with an address — so, to start the ball rolling, I bought a 170-Nitro fishing boat.

Then it was time for Step 2: actually opening up that tackle store. On credit, of course. Thank you very much, Visa and MasterCard. I called it Bass Country, and it was on Cabot Street in Beverly, Mass.

I was pretty excited about it — but it didn't take long for things to go sour.

I opened Bass Country in the late fall, in the dead of what was a particularly bleak New England winter, which, looking back on it, wasn't the ideal time to start a business dedicated to the celebration of the great outdoors.

In the beginning, because we were the new store on the block, people were curious and came in to look around. They weren't actually buying anything, but at least there was the illusion of something going on. But once winter settled in, nothing. I mean, nothing. No one came into the store — why should they? I spent most of the time dreaming about a sudden run on fishing equipment, despite the remote chances of ice fishing going mainstream in my neck of the woods. Although that's not to say that there weren't a few ice fisherman who showed up wanting to buy my shiners.

Most of the day, I sat around with nothing to do and no one to talk to. So, partly to pass the time and partly to motivate anyone who might wander in to actually buy something, I brought a TV down to the store and tuned it to outdoor shows. A great idea, right? Someone walks in, sees someone fishing on screen, says to themselves, "You know, come to think of it, I could use a couple of lures." Only problem was, there was no one there for it to motivate except me. And for some reason it had the opposite effect: I just got depressed because (a) it reminded me of the business I wasn't doing, and (b) the shows sucked.

Since I wasn't doing any business, I thought I might as well make myself useful by giving Angela a much needed break. So, I brought the kids and their toys down to the store, which quickly turned Bass Country into Mad Fisherman Daycare. Though I seriously doubt that most daycare centers have fishing hooks hanging from the wall.

My kids, Anthony and Nikolas, were having a great time watching The Little Rascals and running around with their toys, riding their bikes and stuff, which wasn't really a problem, since there was little chance of hitting anyone except me, while I contemplated whether I should hang myself with fishing line or jump off a bridge.

It didn't seem like things could get any worse, but they did. First, Angela's brother Rick got an infection in his lungs, which was a total surprise for someone as young, healthy, and full of life as he was. He was really sick and it was touch and go there for a while.

So let's take stock: no money, one beat-up truck, I'm selling maybe three shiners a day, and now Angela is dealing with her sick brother. Pretty grim, huh? But wait, it gets worse.

About a week and a half later, Chris, his wife Colleen, Angela, and I are called in to have a sit-down with my mom and dad. They told us that my brother Dave, with whom I'm the closest — we're like two peas in a pod — was extremely sick. Once the shock wore off — but, trust me, it never wears completely off — we knew that someone needed to go out to California to be with him and to figure out exactly what the situation was. Chris and my brother Danny and I decided to go.

Immediately, my father-in-law, Dickie, and his brother, Bob Latini, and my brother-in-law, Bobby Latini, who was seventeen, offered to run the store while I was away. Of course, there was nothing much going on there anyway, but that wasn't the point. The offer was incredible. And even more incredible was that Colleen had a bunch of frequent-flyer miles and offered to pay for my ticket, which I wouldn't have been able to pay for myself.

So, Chris and Danny and I get on the plane — I'm laughing and joking, trying to keep the situation light — and Chris turns to me and says, "Hey, bro, how much money did you bring with you for the trip?"

"Forty dollars."

"Forty dollars!"

"Yeah, forty dollars. That's all I've got to my name."

So, Chris wound up paying for the whole trip.

When we landed, I found a phone and called Angela, just to let her know that we'd landed safely. It turned out to be a more important call than that, because that's when she told me we were having a baby girl.

As it turned out, both Rick and Dave made great recoveries, Dave against all odds. And what that proved to me is that there must be a strong determination gene in the Moore family.

By the time I got back from California, the handwriting was on the wall. And what it said was: "It's over." The time I'd spent with Dave kind of opened my eyes to the fact that you don't have much time on this earth, so you'd better use it well.

Get the picture? It was bad. Real bad. And being back at the store didn't help. I remember people coming into the store while I was in the back changing diapers. "Hey, can I get a couple of shiners?"

"Yeah, sure. I'll be right with you after I finish with the Pampers."

Basically, the store had become a great place for me to go and lose money. Money I didn't even have, by the way. The only ones who actually came in, besides my kids, were a few friends of mine, and they sure as hell didn't buy anything. Customers would buy a reel, then they'd come back to friggin' exchange it, and all I'm making is five bucks. In that first month, I realized that I'd be sitting there nickel-and-diming myself for the next thirty years.

But something good did come out of those tough times: I discovered the loyalty of my in-laws. They were the ones who came in and worked that store, even helping to build the walls. My mother-in-law gave me money; my father-in-law gave me time — and his tools — but I did hold up my end by supplying the duct tape.

I put in this big lure order for crank baits, which was the stupidest thing I ever did. Suddenly, I owed $565 for crank baits. And those damn crank baits sat on the wall for weeks. Not one person bought one. Every time my mother-in-law came into the store, I'd see her glance over at those crank baits — because she'd had to pay for them; otherwise, I couldn't have afforded them. After a couple weeks of those crank baits just sitting there, before my mother-in-law would come in, I'd run over and take four or five off of them off the rack and stash them in a drawer, just to give the illusion that someone was buying them. As soon as she'd leave, I'd put them back up on the wall.

After a month or two, pretty much everybody realized that it wasn't going to happen for me. Even now, it's very emotional for me to talk about those times, the times when I was really down on my luck. My father-in-law, Dickie, would work the store to give me a break, which meant a lot to me. I'd come in after he'd worked for three or four hours and he would say, "We sold some cigars and a couple of lures and some spare baits. We made $42.50."

"That's great," I'd say.

After a couple of days of us doing well, or rather Dickie doing well, I happened to be upstairs in his bedroom. I opened up this bag and found all the "sold" lures and cigars. I just started to cry. I never told Dickie about that because, quite frankly, I needed the $42.50.

"It's Always Darkest Before the Dawn" ... What a Load of Crap That Is

If I thought things couldn't get any worse, I was wrong. One day, I was sitting there alone, except for Anthony and Nikolas, of course. While they were playing in the background, I was contemplating suicide. Yes, it was that grim. If somebody came in at that moment to rob me, I would have said, "Shoot me before you leave and why don't you take the crank baits with you, because it'll help my mother-in-law. Just take the crank baits and shoot me!"

While I'm in the midst of all these exit strategies, the door opens and in walks this guy dressed in a suit and tie. Not my typical customer profile.

"How ya doin'?" he says.

"I'm doin' fine," I say, lying through my teeth.

"I work for the mayor's office. What's your name?"

"Charlie Moore."

"Well, Mr. Moore, we've got a problem."

Now I've got lots of problems, most of which I know all too well, so I don't need this guy to list them for me. Nor do I need him to give me any new ones, although I have a sneaking suspicion that that's exactly what's going to happen.

"Oh yeah, what's that?"

"Well, I see that you've got a truck parked in front of your store and in the back of that truck there's a sign that says 'cigars.' First of all, the truck is parked illegally, so you've got to get it out of there, and second of all, you can't keep that sign there."

Now remember, I'm on death's door. I got no money. I can't pay for anything. In fact, things had gotten so bad that I'd started selling individual cigars to bring in some cash, which explains the sign. And, to be quite honest, the cigars were the only thing that was keeping the door open. And now this guy, from the mayor's office no less, is coming into my store telling me I've got to take down my sign.

Did he just happen to be passing by, see the truck and the sign, and think, "Well, what we've got here is a violation of City Code 273?" Nope. I'm pretty sure the city was called by the liquor store owner next door. That guy was always busting my chops because he didn't want my truck parked there, either because he thought it was an eyesore or because he wanted the spot for himself.

Talk about kicking a dog when he's down. Here's this guy, one of the mayor's henchmen, coming in to bully me just because the guy next door was complaining. Of course, later, the guy in the liquor store acted as if he had no idea what I was talking about.

They say shit always runs downhill and, unfortunately for me, I'm at the bottom of that hill. What would I do? True, I could beat the crap out of the liquor store owner. Or I could hire a lawyer with the money from all those crank baits I was selling. Or maybe I could bribe the guy from the mayor's office with two or three crank baits to leave me alone. Or I could just move my truck and take the sign down.

No truck parked in front of the store, no sign on the street, no cigar sales, equaled total disaster, making it impossible to stay in business.

The Cigar Sign That Broke the Camel's Back

To make matters even worse, in the middle of this argument between me and the guy from the mayor's office, Nikolas started crying. He needed to have his diaper changed. Only there were no more diapers. Meanwhile, Anthony says to me, "Dad, I'm hungry."

But I got no food. And I got no diapers. All I got is cigars, lures, and bait. So, I put Nikolas in the carriage and I say to Anthony, "Let's go home."

On my way out, I grabbed a cigar and locked the door behind me. Frankly, I don't remember much of that afternoon, because it felt like I was walking down the center of Cabot Street, waiting for a bus to hit me. I moved through a cloud of anger, contemplating what to do with my life from that point forward. The truth of the matter is, I don't remember everything that happened on that walk, but I do remember the mind-set. That I remember well.

I'm walking home with my two kids, smoking a mild, five-dollar Macanudo cigar. It felt like it took five years to get home, but during those five years I do remember taking a deep puff on that Macanudo, letting the smoke out slowly, and saying to myself, "What the hell am I gonna do with the rest of my life? I have no college degree. I have no money. I have no food. I have no diapers. I have no cigar sign. But I do have plenty of crank baits, which nobody wants." What the hell do I do?

When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Go on Vacation

When we hit rock bottom it was rock bottom. Again, we didn't even have enough money to buy food for our kids. We couldn't buy diapers. It was that bad. I don't know if anyone in my family realized how bad it really was.

During that period, my in-laws would rent a cabin in Maine for the month of July. We didn't have enough money to rent our own cabin so sometimes we would stay with them. It got pretty tight in there, what with Angela, Anthony, Nikolas, and me, but we were outdoors most of the time, so it didn't really matter much.

Angela's sister, Christine, and her husband, Bill, and their family had their own cabin. Bill was doing pretty well at the time. He wasn't exactly lighting the world on fire, but to us his family seemed like the Rockefellers because they could do things that we couldn't. There was never any bitterness, but I have to admit that sometimes I thought, "It'd be nice to go to the grocery store and be able to get food." Or, "It'd be nice to have a vehicle that worked."

Maine offered phenomenal fishing. One day, about halfway into their vacation, my father-in-law called me and said, "The fish are biting, Charlie. Oh, my God, while I'm standing here talking to you I just caught a smallmouth."

"I'm coming up, Dickie. I swear to God I'm coming up."

When my father-in-law told me he'd caught that fish, my whole life changed. I hung up the phone, turned to Angela, and said, "Pack up the kids. We're going up to Maine to visit your parents. We're going on this camping trip if it kills us. Let's drag out the friggin' pickup truck. Daddy needs a vacation."

I had this big, green, four-speed F-250, a true redneck truck with raised tires and featuring an eight-foot bed. It was the only vehicle we had and it wasn't worth any money, other than the tires and rims, maybe. It wasn't anything to write home about, but I loved it. I put Nikolas in his car seat in the middle, and Angela sat on the outside with Anthony on her lap (Angela was almost nine months pregnant at this point with our third child, Kaitlin), and we were off.

Talk about a redneck vacation — it was totally "blue light special," baby, because we were going camping. Sure, I've got the beat-up truck, but I've got no money. In fact, I'm counting change for gas.

We drove that son-of-a-gun all the way up to Maine. That thing was hitting every bump. I was listening to Alan Jackson on the tape player, my window was down, I was smoking a cigar, and the kids were all packed in the front with us. I looked over at Angela. She was a real trooper, man. She was so happy we were going and, even though she was worried about having the baby, she was still thrilled to go up there and spend time with her parents.

That was a great time and, to me, that is the definition of true love, right there. And the meaning of success. Because when you're up against the wall and you can still crack a smile and feel good about yourself, that's it. Most people can't feel good because they're not driving what they want. But although I didn't have the things that I wanted, I had my family, which is more important to me than anything, and we were going fishing. To me, that is the distinction between fishermen like myself and guys who, in a similar situation, would call it a day, sit back on the couch, and watch TV.

Yes, Mr. Coppola, I'm Ready for My Close-Up

Once I got back to the real world, I had to deal with my real life. And what I was going to do with it.

As a kid, I had always wanted to be the starting quarterback for the Washington Redskins or the center fielder for the Boston Red Sox and be, you know, famous. Well, the QB and center field things weren't looking too good, so that left just the "famous" thing, which really appealed to me since I had always craved attention, even as a kid. Big surprise, huh?

At that point, I knew the outdoor store was pretty much over, but one good thing about the experience was the TV on the counter which, when it wasn't tuned to The Little Rascals for my kids, would run those outdoor fishing shows that taped throughout the country.

People — notice, I didn't say customers — would come in and ask me, "Don't you get bored?" and I'd say, "Yeah, but I keep myself as busy as I can." Then they'd reply, "No. I mean watching these shows."

Hell, yeah, I got bored. Why wouldn't I? Most of them were pretty damn bad. And that's why, after a while, I said to myself, "I can do better."

So, that day, while walking with my two kids, smoking that five-dollar cigar, and trying to figure out the meaning of life, my life, it hit me, right between Appleton Avenue and Prospect Street.

"Ya know what?" I thought. "I'm gonna get my own TV show. No, really. I am."

Charlie Moore's book, "The Mad Fisherman: Kick Some Bass with America's Wildest TV Host," is published this month by St. Martin's Press and is available at major book retailers. For more information on Charlie Moore, the Mad Fisherman, visit his Web site, www.charliemoore.com.