Nick LeBrun is only one of 200 top pro fishermen in the world.

All-American blue collar fisherman had reached the end of the road

Each week, 318 Forum’s Tony Taglavore takes to lunch a local person — someone who is well-known, successful, and/or influential, and asks, “What’s Your Story?”

He was on top of the world.

At least he was supposed to be. It was the fall of 2017, and the good ol’ boy from Vivian with a country accent as heavy as a seven-pound bass, had just won the All-American. A blue-collar tournament for 5,000 folks fishing on the divisional and regional level, the All-American was a career springboard for its winner. This particular blue-collar fisherman had worked years to realize his boyhood dream of making a living by sitting in a boat and casting a line.

“I won $100,000. I won this big trophy.

There were all these TV cameras. It was all this stuff I had been chasing, but I felt more empty and hopeless than ever. It didn’t get rid of that ugliness that was on the inside of me.”

The ugliness of being addicted to pornography since he was a young teenager.

“I can take you to a spot on Crawford Road in Oil City, where me and my dad had been hunting. We pulled over on this little dirt road to take a leak, and there was a big trash pile with some magazines on top. I don’t have to tell you what those magazines were. I saw that, kept looking at that, and it triggered something in my head.”

The ugliness of having cheated — and continuing to cheat — on his wife, Jolene, with whom he had two small children.

“It got to where I was so de-sensitized, looking at (pornography) wasn’t enough. That turned into infidelity. It turned into me making a very serious mistake and being unfaithful to my wife. That mistake continued for a few years.”

The ugliness of living a life of lies while everyone thought he was as good as they come.

“At that time in my life, I was not a Christian. I had great parents that taught me a lot, but there wasn’t a Christian upbringing. There was no spiritual upbringing. Without having that foundation, I just viewed myself as a good person. My good outweighed my bad.”

One night, not long after becoming an all-American on the water, his wife found out her husband wasn’t an all-American in life.

“(She) calls me, and she is just — I will never forget the pain and sadness and the shriek of her voice, her crying, and just the hurt that was there.”

The “other woman” had called and told all. Professional fisherman and Bossier City’s Nick LeBrun told me this story, and his story, during lunch at a place of his choosing, Taqueria San Miguel in Benton. Nick had the San Miguel beef enchiladas and a Coke. I had the San Miguel salad with grilled chicken and water with lemon.

“All my lies were poured out for everybody to see. My family was shattered into a million pieces over all those lies I had been telling for so long. They were finally out in the open. My wife said, ‘I don’t ever want to see you again. Don’t come home.’”

So, Nick didn’t. At 11 p.m., he pulled off the side of Highway 96 in Jasper, Texas.

“I had a Springfield XDM 40-caliber in my lap. I’m done with life. I’m hopeless. I’ve gone too far. There’s no turning back.

“That night was the lowest point in my life. The darkest, deepest pain I have ever experience.”

But something — perhaps someone above — told Nick to make one last phone call. He did, to a longtime friend Nick calls a “man’s man.” He told Nick to wait, then abruptly hung up. Seconds later, Nick’s phone rang. He didn’t recognize the number but answered.

“I just wanted to call and tell you that I don’t know all the details, but what you’re thinking about doing is not the answer,” said the chaplain for Shreveport and Bossier fire and police departments . ... “Just to be honest with you, that’s a chicken crap way to go. That’s not what men do.”

The chaplain — perhaps with help from someone above — saved Nick’s life.

“God used him in a mighty way that night to get me to put that gun down,” Nick remembers.

The chaplain was also a Christian-based marriage counselor, and while Nick and his wife were separated, Nick began seeing the counselor for help. Meanwhile, Nick’s wife was praying for her husband to be saved.

“God put on her heart grace for me.” A month after that night on the side of the road, Nick and Jolene started talking. They went to counseling together. Nick took Jolene on a second first date.

“I didn’t know if our marriage would survive, but I knew I needed to change the way I was living, and I could only do that by having faith in Jesus and asking him to change me.”

But change wasn’t easy — it never is. Like when Jolene challenged Nick to listen to Christian music.

“I was so into extreme heavy metal. For me to listen to Christian music would be like asking you go to on the news wearing a wife-beater tank top. It was totally out of character.”

However, on July 8, 2018, Nick walked into church with Jolene. He was ready to change. He was ready to accept God in his life.

“I got down on my knees at that altar, cried out to Jesus and told him that I was sorry for my sin, and that I’m turning from all that. I said, ‘I believe in you, Lord. I want you to save me.’ I got up off my knees, and I was changed. I had peace and joy in my heart.”

Nick, now 40 years old, and Jolene have been married 12 years. January will be Nick’s seventh year on the pro fishing tour.

“Whether my career is 10 years or 30 years, I will never wrap my head around the fact there are only about 200 top pros in the world, and I’m one of those.”

Thinking Nick probably had to go test a spinner bait or recalibrate his depth finder, I asked my final question. As always, what is it about his life that might inspire others?

“Trophies don’t last, but Jesus Christ lasts forever. When we chase things of the world — trophies, money, fame, fortune, status, whatever that is, those aren’t necessarily bad things. But those things are temporary, and we have to realize that. Don’t put those things at the forefront of what our focus is. But if we have a relationship with Jesus Christ and we are living for him, that will never end. That will always be.”

Oh, and one more thing. “Answering the phone matters.”