The Dam

As more and more people flee to Colorado to fish I find myself looking back to my place of origin.  West Paterson, New Jersey is where I learned to fly fish at a private pond.  Isn’t it ironic that I now look back from the gorgeous mountain West where my soul has thrived for decades - to New Jersey?

So here I am in Colorado Springs, a retired educator and a struggling fly-fishing guide, dealing with crowds and traffic all over again. I say “struggling” only because it is difficult now to fish alone anymore.  

Is life really cyclical as some of our philosophers propose?  I am not comfortable with the increased noise, traffic and population - so shall I keep moving?

Strangely and more specifically, I am reminiscing about a dam my brother, I and some friends built on a little creek behind our house.  I was around 10 or 11 years old, my brother 3 years older.  The creek area behind our house was a green belt of sorts.  We believed no one owned it so we considered it our property. 

So one day we just started digging - moving tons of rock and dirt to form a dam. The water backed up and soon we had a pond. The pond that formed was substantial.  The dam was 5 feet wide so we could easily walk across it. The hole in one corner was 5 feet deep.

Ducks flew in. We brought in buckets of fish (most were largemouth bass) that we would feed in the hope that they’d become permanent residents. I rarely fished in the pond - I just liked to watch the fish explore their new home. I loved to throw live worms out to them.

Why was I so fixated on this small pool?

I can tell you why. Because that little pond behind the dam was Ours. We built it. We protected it. We guarded it.

And I would pay more than I care to admit to once again have it or something similar.  

I would walk home from school every day and check on the dam making sure there were no leaks and make sure the fish were still around. However, one day I came home and I felt something was different.

It was gone. The dam and the pond were just - gone.   A bulldozer had come up from the ball field below and with one big push took half of the dam out - releasing the water and the fish.

I would often wonder what exactly happened to the bass (and one giant carp and some catfish) as they went tumbling down the ravine. I could see them cascading and tumbling down in confusion. Their world (and mine) disturbed.  

Such childhood losses are difficult to assess. We found out that a neighbor had called the city and was concerned about our dam. This would be one of my first experiences feeling overpowered by people and agencies stronger than I.

What over weeks my friends and I had built with our hands (and out of the earth itself) – those without eyes to see destroyed in minutes with a machine.

I had to find a way to let it go - but I still cling.

Now when I go to “our” South Platte River it’s difficult for me to think of it as “mine”.  There are so many guides and clients and anglers all over the place.  If given the choice of having that one little section of creek, of having my dam and looking once again for my fish in that pool, I would choose that pool every time over what I see now.

I think of the old Iron John story. The boy is asked by his mythological mentor to stand guard of the pool and not let anything harm it. This task would serve as part of his initiation into manhood. In a very real way he is a type of Adam – stewarding the pool like Adam was to steward the Garden.

But how do we stop a bulldozer?