EDWIN EVERS: A matter of perspective

Mercury pro reflects on life, focuses on family during holiday season

I’ve never been one to dwell on the past. If I have a bad tournament, I take away things I need to learn from it and move on to the next. Same for a good tournament: It’s in the past, and there’s no reason to live in anything but the present.

My whole career, I’ve focused on spending my energy on what I can control and make better. I treat the offseason the same way: assess what happened throughout the tournament year and figure out what I need to work on to become a better angler. There’s always another season to get ready for.

That said, fishing isn’t my focus right now. This time of year is more about family, and it’s about perspective.

Milestones and memories

I turned 50 this year. It doesn’t seem like that long ago that I was 20 years old and wanting nothing more than to make a living fishing. Sometimes I have to pinch myself. The time flew by. It’s been a blur.

It’s milestones like that – a big birthday or the fact that I have another grandbaby on the way – that help me put everything in perspective. I’m that enthusiastic 20-year-old one day and in the blink of an eye I’ve got two-and-a-half decades of professional bass fishing under my belt. It really makes me appreciate everything that much more.

I’m very fortunate and very blessed to be where I’m at. I’ve had a good career and I’m still hungry for more. The 2025 season is going to be a blast (more on that in my next blog). I’m ready for it to start, but not quite ready with the holidays here.

Family and festivities

Depending on when you’re reading this, my wife and I may have already closed up shop for the season on the pecan farm. We – and all our great help – have been working daylight to dark for a couple months and at 2 o’clock on Christmas Eve, we’re done for the season. It’s been a great season, too. We started roasting and flavoring our pecans in-house this year and it’s made the product so much better. A lot of work, but worth it.

We also just took a family trip to Eureka Springs and stayed in a house my mother-in-law rented: my family and my brother-in-law’s family just hanging out for a few days, playing cards and board games, eating good food and enjoying everyone’s company. There’s nothing like that kind of togetherness, especially around the holidays.

And again, it’s times like this, during the holiday season, that it’s easy to gain some perspective on life and family and, yes, fishing. I’m already thinking about my new boat and that new boat smell and breaking in my new Mercury. But I’m also thinking about my son, who’s a sophomore in high school and who’ll be off chasing his own dreams in a couple years and who I’m going to be spending plenty of time with on the water between Christmas and New Year’s.

The shopping and travel and all that can stress some people out. I’m just excited because it’s a really special time to sit back and reflect and enjoy those people who are the closest to you, and that’s what’s most important to me. Perspective.

I’m excited for the 2025 season to start. When it gets here, I’m going to be ready. I’ll just be enjoying the rest of the offseason in the meantime and making the most of the time with the people I care about most. It goes by fast.