Two Ponds With Big Fish

I have a pond story; The pond where as a child I first learned to fly fish. There were some big Bass in that pond.

Last week I traveled back to my home state of New Jersey. Let’s just say I had to be there. While I was driving around a golf course a kid with a fishing rod crossed the street right in front of me. I just had to roll down my window and ask, “Any big Bass in that golf course pond?” I added that I was a fly fisher from Colorado because I wanted him to know this was not an investigation.

He put his finger up to his lips and said, “Shhh,” as though he were guarding a great secret. He then added, “I got a large mouth around 7 pounds the other day.”

Wow!  And I believed him. He was the kind of kid that appeared to tell the truth. He went on to explain how he has to be careful and stay out of the way of the golfers. He knew the rules. He was not defiant. He knew how to respectfully play the edge.

I also as a child learned the rules of fishing a pond. I had to be discrete and hang back in the woods until the right time. When I did fish, it was the back side of “my” pond. I did not want to be openly defiant and anger the grounds keeper.

That pond provided a wonderful and enchanting world to me. It helped me develop as a fly fisher, a teacher, a guide, and as an individual. In fact, that pond changed my life. And the kid crossing the street on his way to hook perhaps another big fish, reminded me of that former world.

I think the next time I am back in New Jersey I will bring my fly rod and stalk the back side of that pond along the outer edge of the golf course. However, as I once did as a child, I will have to remember that this is not my pond. It belongs to someone else.

Although, perhaps in some other place and time, the pond belongs to this kid I saw who asked me to keep it a secret in the same way that I once thought a pond belonged to me.  Regardless, I will have to mind my manners. I will need to hang back on the outer edges and be ready. If needed, to dart back in the woods.

But perhaps in certain moments, as I cast, I might cross over into a former world I once knew.  And one of my casts might find a large fish lurking among the weed beds chasing down a streamer fly.