Pyramid Lake, Nevada and the Sacrifice of the Fish
Was that an Ordinary Fish or a Trickster?
Have you ever had an experience that seemed odd but ordinary that ends up with extraordinary significance? Something you look back on and say that helped to change me? Looking back on my visits to Pyramid Lake, I realize its importance in my growing belief that the natural world is as magical as it is material.
I was with my boyfriend, Stan, on one of my trips to Pyramid Lake. Stan Halemano was Hawaiian born and raised. Some of that time he lived in Honolulu, but when he was young he lived in a little rural farm and listened to the traditional Hawaiian stories. Stories of the gods and spirits tied to the land and to the water.
A couple of times in my life I’ve become lovers with men who were a little more at home with the mysteries involved in stories like these. Stan was one of these men.
We camped on one of the deserted beaches.
One that could best be reached by boat or four-wheel drive. We had a blue Ford Falcon that we later discovered was prone to get stuck in the soft sand at the end of those bumpy dirt roads. We camped like the young poor people we were, with only a little pup tent and a couple of sleeping bags. We brought hot dogs, buns, bananas, and tomatoes with us for all of our meals. No need for pots and pans or silverware.
We lit a small fire for warmth. While we sat next to that fire that night, I told him the Pauite stories that I’d heard about the lake; about the Stone Mother and the water babies who lived in the lake and lured people to their death by drowning.
He took those stories more seriously than I did.
He woke several times during the night
“Did you hear that?” He asked me.
Something scurried around our camp.
“Probably a raccoon,” I told him.
I curled up next to him and he seemed to go back to sleep.
Later we woke to the sound of moaning.
“Just the wind,” I said.
We tried to go back to sleep as the wind strengthened and threatened to tear down our tent.
Later still the coyotes set up an alarm in the nearby hills.
Neither of us got much sleep that night. Trash was strewn around our camp when we got up in the morning.
We decided to go home instead of staying one more night as we’d planned.
We picked up the trash, folded up our tent, rolled up our bags, and sat down by the lake to eat our bananas. As we sat, a big fish jumped out of the lake and onto the beach about ten feet away from us. We ran to catch him as he lay there flopping. We didn’t recognize the species but he was big and we thought he could make several meals for us. We couldn’t believe our good luck. We took our beer out of the foam ice chest and threw him in.
On the way home, we discussed the way that fish just offered himself to us. What a gift, we thought. Stan told me about the ways they cooked whole fish on the islands. Maybe we could cook it up and invite the neighbors.
On the way home that fish began to worry us.
“Why do you think he jumped on the beach?” I asked. “Do you think he was sick?”
“Do you think we should eat him?” Stan asked.
“I don’t know.”
We were quiet for a while. Our sense of uneasiness grew.
“That fish could be bad,” Stan said. “Do those stories you told me last night say anything about fish?”
“I think they had a traditional fish, the Cui-ui, but I haven’t heard any stories about them.”
We got home and unpacked. We were hungry and thought about the fish in the ice chest.
“I don’t think we should eat him,” Stan said. “Just in case.”
“He might have worms,” I said.
“He could be some sort of trick the lake is pulling on us,” Stan said.
It seemed we’d made a decision. I was afraid of that fish and was glad to let go of the idea of eating him.
We had the rest of our hot dogs for dinner and put the fish, ice chest and all, out by the trash. They picked it up the next day.
Stan and I camped out at Pyramid many more times before we broke up, staying close by the fire or in the tent after dark. We never had another fish jump for us. If the water babies cried in the night, they were drowned out by the howling of the coyotes.
I’ll never know whether we squandered a gift from the gods or saved ourselves from a trickster that could have introduced more trouble into our already shaky relationship. I do know my small-p paganism was partially shaped by the memory of that fish and his sacrifice.
