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Jackson: Winter's enduring test of time

Changing my clock to another hour this weekend isn't going to make any dent in my disposition.

Moving our clocks one hour ahead is not going to influence my sleep schedule, nor will it matter to me if the next occupant in the White House decides to place the country and its clocks on Mid-East time schedules.

This silly, ritualistic changing of the hour hand continues to be a symbol of a government gone wild. The jumping ahead of our precious time seems to put many anglers into a communal pot of dither.

Many people become apologists after forgetting the ritual and become ashamed to admit that this changing of the time is nothing more than a line or two from fairy tales.

Clock changing in our area is supposed to signify (among other things) that a seasonal change is about to spring out and whisk away all that snow, ice, and crusty salt. Once the sun sustains a warming routine, you watch as the herds of eat-starved souls create traffic jams unseen since some indistinguishable date last year.

With my T-shirt thoroughly soaked and my head dripping with perspiration, my legs were exhausted as I stepped off the treadmill. After a quick change of shirts, I headed to the "fishing department" to start my annual tackle inspection.

Because my basement looks like a scene from that reality show "American Pickers," I had to don a pair of old jeans, locate an old pair gloves and place a hard hat on my noggin to protect me from falling videocassette boxes. My video collection of mundane outdoor shows has been stored on the upper shelf of a basement storage unit, and in the past I have been crowned by the hard plastic cases when I searched for something.

It had been just one of my typical winter days.

I had two outings of ice fishing under my belt, and that in itself was a mere memory from a series of days when cold weather was nothing more than a passing thought.

I know many of you out there are wishing this "stuff" would go quickly away, but this has been a winter season that refuses to let go of its grip. Is Global warming a made-up issue or a coming reality?

Oh sure, I hear the excuses all the time. I am constantly lectured by people who, like me, grew up in the city. They never fail to tell me how going to school was a ritual, with the old-fashioned rubber boots, stocking hat, heavy scarf, and a mindset that guided each youth through the mountains of snow growing every day on the side streets leading to every grammar school.

Kids have it easy in today's electronic playtime world.

The days of mushing through our Chicago neighborhoods are stories for the dinner table because that's all they area, stories. The family minivan chauffeurs the kids to and from school and the ubiquitous malls. Thumbs become blistered from texting while mom or dad heads onward for a kid's day on the loose.

I'm just an old, grumpy guy trying to find my tackle box and a couple light rods before spring arrives so once the ice becomes a memory the area scribes can begin crying for those moments when elusive panfish move to the weeds and the buffets of nature's cornucopia of buggy things and swimming miniatures return.

Dream on friend.

• Contact Mike Jackson at angler88@comcast.net, catch his radio show 7-9 a.m. Sundays on WGCO 1590-AM (live-streamed at www.1590WCGO.com) and get more content at mikejacksonoutdoors.com.

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