Wet lines

When I met Kelly she was an active fisher woman before any of my influences.  She had a nice fishing pole and a tackle box loaded with all of the prerequisite gear needed for success at the lake.  So when we went fishing for the first few times I was met with a new phenomenon an avid angler like myself had never seen.  She liked to “decorate” her pole.  Sigh.

Of course she broke me into this compulsion gradually.  At first she would have a fairly normal setup; hook, line, and sinker.  We would add either a worm or powerbait and away she would go.  I was proud to be with a woman who fished and excited to have her there with me.  Then came the compulsion.

At first it would start with a daredevil lure baited with powerbait, then advance to a variety of the most colorful selections in her bag and the powerbait would turn into a golf ball size glob.  “I think the fish will like my pretty colors,” she would say with true conviction.  “I’m going to catch the biggest fish in the lake.”  I remember wondering if she had stumbled on a manner of fish suicide.

Then came the day we were in a store and she found a bag of beads and other sparkles.  “I could decorate my pole with these,” she squealed excitedly imploring me to buy them for her.  The result was a rig three feet long of all kinds of pretty colors on the end of her line.  She casted once and I heard the comment, “looks like a parade going by” from a nearby fisherman.  Sigh!

I could tell she wanted to catch a fish and she just couldn’t understand why she wasn’t catching anything.  It was time to do something.  So on the next trip I convinced her to put a fly and a bubble on her pole.  She looked at the setup I had given her with one of those disapproving faces I knew meant there is not enough color.  I assured her that if she didn’t catch anything we could go back to the “decorations”.  As she made her first cast I prayed to the fish gods like I have never prayed before.  Please let her catch a fish!

Sure enough not a moment later she had a nice rainbow in tow.  That fish was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen, I think I almost kissed it when it hit the bank.  I have never been so excited over a 12″ trout in my life.  That day she caught  21 fish in about 3 hours.  Hardly a cast went by without her catching one or getting a strike.  She out fished me that day, my fly pole couldn’t keep up.

Since that day the “decorations” have yet to return.  I even caught her using my fly pole once when I went back to the truck.  This year we purchased her a fly pole, float tube, fins and waders.  I can’t be more proud!

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You know as I was buying neoprene waders today I realized how much adulthood can complicate fishing.  I’m not saying we don’t still fish with the same passion we just at some point in our lives decide that we need more stuff to go fishing.

I can remember as a boy wading endless rivers and streams in nothing but my sneakers, “Fishing shoes” I called them, and shorts.  Of course these were mountain streams that seemed so cold at times I was convinced everything was glacier fed.  But as a kid you were okay with the varying levels of numbness and hypothermia you encountered.  It was always more important to reach that other bank or that hidey hole behind the big rock in the middle then your own personal comfort. 

Now in my 30’s something seems to have come over me that I can’t explain.  I can barely stick my toe into a lake or stream without having serious reservations about wading in.  Hence the new waders.  And of course with the new waders come a rod and reel that have to meet certain specifications designed by engineers in a test lab somewhere who have convinced me of their inane findings.  Now I must have tippet material and dope my line.  I must have a landing net and that chest pack.  I have somehow lost my inner kid!

 Its not that I have lost my love for fishing by any means, now it is even more precious to me.  I just wish somedays I was once again in my fishing shoes, numb from the waist down with spinning line as tippet.  Only worried about reaching that next fish.

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