My best friends are all fishermen. Looking back over four decades, I see the trend, and it’s those souls who’ve shared the woods and water who are closest to my heart. Our time on the water bonds. It sews meaningful friendship. Shared exploration brings us together as...
They all come and go. The friends we love eventually leave. Some find jobs across the country, moving hundreds of miles away, with a promise to keep in touch or return with frequency, to rekindle old fishing memories and cast again to all the familiar haunts. But such...
Turn into the fly shop and strike up a conversation with the dude behind the counter, and he might tell you the Olives are hatching around noon on most days. That’s nice. And if he really has his ear to the ground or his feet in the water, he’ll know that those Olives...
Right on time, Smith’s signature worn-out ball cap crested the hill on the north side of the gravel pull off. When his full frame came into view, I motioned to the propane grill and smiled with a nod. It was preheated. Resting on a large chunk of limestone, I had the...
Just after one-o-clock, I glanced up from my notebook and saw the rhythmic taillights of a small USPS Jeep outside my studio window. Its red lamps brightened and dimmed rhythmically through a misting rain and a spring fog which the afternoon couldn’t shake off. The mail carrier stopped at each mailbox, and the lights pulsed, all the way down the long hill of my cul-de-sac.
I typed but a few more words before I remembered — Sawyer’s line should arrive today!
Moments later I jogged down the hill of my driveway with untied boot laces. I pulled up the hood of my sweatshirt just before exiting the carport and aimed for the mailbox with the excitement of a kid at Christmas.
And there it was. Mixed in with a few articles of junk mail and a bank statement, I found a small standard-white envelope which Sawyer had addressed as such: Domenick Swentosky, Esquire (a long-running inside joke that the mailman unlikely found amusing). On the way up the driveway I fingered the circular wraps of monofilament underneath stiff envelope paper . . .
Burke had been traveling.
North, south, east or west I cannot share because I’ve been sworn to secrecy. You see, the best river spots are enhanced by our conviction of their rarity, believing that they are special enough to be protected, even if they aren’t all that far off the radar.
Week after week, Burke had returned with stories of catching large brown trout and the photos to prove it. Not club fish, because he wouldn’t bother with those. And not private water with trout fed from the banks and kept like zoo animals. That wasn’t our game. Ours was the unremitting chase of wild brown trout, and perhaps a fundamental urge for discovery . . .
I’m guarded about my fishing partners. I always have been, I suppose, and I think that’s alright. I grew up fishing mostly by myself, and that’s still the way it usually turns out for me. Sure, I love hanging out with fishy friends before and after, but when we hit the stream, I’m usually the guy who takes off and says I’ll see you at lunchtime. But on occasion, all of that changes for a day . . .
The border collie always sensed incoming weather before I did. Under the perfect contrast of black on white, just beneath mottled pink skin and between the ears, was a group of unknown senses, not just for the weather, but for a number of intangibles I never seemed to recognize. He tilted his head and stared at me with confusion, perhaps wondering why I couldn’t hear, smell or sense the thunderstorm before I could see it . . .
The trout were on. They started with nymphs, but as soon as the emerging tan caddis popped to the surface, a green summer morning turned into something special.
Steve was the first to switch to dry flies. Around 9:30 a.m. I leapfrogged his position again and stopped to visit for a moment. Steve spoke as I approached.
“Man, these are the days you dream about,” he said while casting.
Standing in the creek, not far off the bank, he glanced over his left shoulder in my direction, judging the length of his fly line against the back casting space I’d left him. And I continued wading closer to my friend in the ankle-deep water.
“You switched to dries?” I used the statement as a question . . .
Fishing with a stick and line is a solitary endeavor by nature. It always comes down to the two hands of one angler: one on the rod, and the other in control of the line. Sharing the water with friends is great, but fishing, inherently, is not a team sport. It’s more like pole vaulting than a baseball game. It comes down to individual performance. And at its root, fishing is just a contest between one man and a fish.
. . . But we fish together to share our experiences, to learn from one another, to catch up with old friends and make new ones. We choose to fish together because the bonds formed on a river are like none other, and because flowing water and shared moments can heal friendships and mend grievances . . .