treatment. And some MS
symptoms persisted. Often
troubled with his balance and
tiring quickly, Smith relied on
Colt more than ever, while
continuing to work long hours.
He didn’t want the disease to
prevent him from doing his job,
and that mental battle—adapting
to his new reality—would be
his biggest fight yet.
A new reality
One day, fish camp owner Andy
Hall spent a foul-weathered day
on the water, preparing a new
fishing site. With Smith in one
boat and Hall in the other, the
two bickered over where and
how to set the sites. The tension
showed, and the crew picked up
on the conflict. Hall, sensing that
there was more going on than a
power struggle between boss and
foreman, told Smith, “Let’s go for
a ride.” They took a work truck
down the beach, pulled over and
began to talk.
PHOTO BY ANDY HALL
“I said, ‘We need your knowledge
and abilities, but you’re not the
strongest guy, physically, on the
crew anymore,’” Hall says. “In
the past you’ve been the guy who
can think faster, move faster,
lift more and tear the engine
apart on the fly—you can do
all these things that everybody
else has to do with a lot of
forethought and preparation.”
Jeff Smith (left) and crewman
Graham Zimmerman check
their salmon nets.
Learning to change
Hall wanted Smith to understand
what everyone on the crew
already knew: “We need your
brain, not necessarily your
muscles. But you have to be
willing to delegate and lead, you
have to pass that knowledge on,
to take on that new role.”
PHOTO BY ANDY HALL
Afterwards, Hall says, a shift
occurred. “His medical condition
is forcing him to start relying
on other attributes that he’s
got,” Hall says. “And he’s lucky
because he’s just as smart as he is
strong. His instincts on the water
are so far beyond most people’s
that he has a tremendous amount
to offer us even if he’s not the one
driving the stakes or pulling the
nets or filling the sand bags.”
Commercial fishing in Alaska is
challenging, Smith acknowledges.
But it’s who he is, and what he
lives to do. So he accepts his
limitations, and his new role as
a mentor, but he won’t let MS
define him.
Melissa DeVaughn is a freelance
writer and commercial fisher who lives
in Chugiak, Alaska, in the off-season
and on the shores of Cook Inlet, Alaska,
while fishing.
