Fly Fishing Glimpses From a Childhood Pond

“In our family there was no clear line between religion and fly fishing” Norman Maclean

After 25 years of being a fly fishing guide and 40 years of fly fishing experience there are a few things I have grown certain of.  I am certain that there is some thing wonderfully spiritual about fly fishing. Fly fishing can be a journey that in many ways parallels our own spiritual journeys through life.

I must confess that most often while fly fishing (or guiding others) I don’t necessarily think about the journey, nor am I aware of it.  I simply feel as though I am “just” fishing.  Nor, do I talk about the spirituality of things all that much. It is always difficult to talk mysteries with any authority.   However, I have reached an age where I find it is appropriate to find words that begin to express what I have learned on the river that moves beyond mere fly fishing technique and at the same time drifts deeper than typical mainstream Christian perspectives.  Helping others to learn the wonderful art of fly fishing is one way for me to share with others the techniques I have learned over 40 years of fly fishing and at the same time to enter into dialogue in regard to the deeper spiritual aspects of life.

Sometimes, after a long day of fishing while I am driving home pondering the day, I may get a glimpse of some deeper meaning that defines the day in some way that is bigger than the fish battled, caught and lost.  Most often these glimpses are quite vague and not very dramatic; Yet, there is something undeniably true of these experiences that lurk below the surface of the currents I fish.   It would not be too much for me to say that I have spent most of my life learning to pay attention to these glimpses that lurk below the surface of not only the waters I fish but also of ordinary day to day experiences.  

My own fly fishing journey began back in New Jersey in 1970 where as a kid I found access to a private pond. It was here, mainly by my self where I taught myself to fly fish. I taught myself to cast, to tie some basic fly patterns and to ‘sight fish’. I distinctly remember walking around the pond while false casting and scanning the water for cruising fish and then when the fish was spotted I would lay the fly out in front of it and watch the fish take the fly. I was mesmerized by the whole process and in due time my skills were sharpened and refined particularly for a young boy of my age and fly fishing became a way of coping with some of the challenges I faced in my youth.  

As a boy I encountered some of the typical challenges that confront many boys trying to figure out life and what it means to be a man. It was only at the pond that I found some solace from these challenges. For me, fly fishing felt as though I was walking on a path; “my” path, a “road less traveled by and one that would make all the difference,”  to paraphrase Robert Frost.  But at the time, I could not fully understand the significance of the path I was on, what I was learning and its place in my life.  

In looking back at my pond experience and placing that experience in context with the rest of my life, I can now get a sense that there was a story evolving. Seemingly random events have taken on new meanings. Was it any accident that I ended up living in Colorado next door to great trout waters and then, by being at the right place at the right time, I became a fly fishing guide for the South Platte River? The very fly fishing skills I learned as a kid,  I now find myself teaching those I guide.  I also don’t think it was an  accident that I have also been an educator (teacher/counselor) for the last 28 years and have taken countless numbers of  school kids fly fishing for the their very first time? And I have learned that many of my young students are/were just as confused and scared as I was as a kid.  I have also shared my story and my fly fishing skills with hundreds of adults with a wide range of abilities, (beginners, intermediates and experts) and learned of their own ‘adult’ journeys and challenges.  Over the years, I have wondered what glimpses and meanings my clients may have been given from the waters they fished.  And sometimes, together, we become aware that our stories overlap. We find there are “common waters” and that is a wonderful feeling of not being alone in our experience.  It bonds us together, not only as fly fishers but  with something deeper below the surface that will never erode.

It is a well known cliché that states everything happens for a reason. But I also understand how cliché’s lose their vitality, particularly a cliché that claims that everything, even the troubles of our world, has its place. There is much that I do not understand.   I remain an ignorant man. Yet as I age, and I look back and pay attention to my own life story,  I can’t but help get one of those little glimpses I spoke of earlier.  And that glimpse simply is the feeling and the ‘knowing’ (and at the same time the hope), that there was some purpose for my childhood experiences when I created  my first flies and taught myself  to cast. There was some purpose for being alone back then and how I found my own path and learned to walk alone.  I am convinced  that  because of these past childhood experiences and countless hours of fly fishing, that  I am supposed to share my own fly fishing journey with others, both kids and adults, and help them along in their journey. It feels right for me to be on this path (as it did when I was a kid), now as a guide/teacher/counselor,  trying to share this wonderful fly fishing  treasure with others.

I look forward to helping you on your own fly fishing journey.