Taking Stock, Counting Blessings....Not Fish

If I fished only to capture fish, my fishing trips would have ended long ago. -Zane Grey

When you are closer to the year 2050 than to the year 2000, and personally closer to the age of 100 than the age of 50, it is a good time to take stock. I have done that a good bit lately, reflecting on my family and what my life may or may not have meant thus far, but most of that is for another time and place. What is written here is about fishing and the joys that it brings to those who become smitten, no, not the best word, obsessed with standing in a creek, waving a fly rod, trying to land a nearly minute fly on the snout of a trout. There ain’t nothing like it.

While I quit counting fish a good while ago, I did it because I realized that the number of fish distracted me from what I enjoyed the most. I have learned that nature in so many forms is constantly fascinating and that it is a wonderful opponent. Just being out in nature, turning off the noise that sometimes consumes our life today, enjoying the birds, the plants, the seasons, the often ridiculous folks I fish with, and the trout is a fantastic gift. Please don’t ask me which component of the preceding sentence I enjoy the most because that changes frequently, by the season, and often on each trip.

Having fished for over 70 years, I may have caught a thousand, or maybe even thousands of fish. Most of which I don’t remember. I do remember a 50-fish day in a Georgia pond with Rusty and 19 sailfish, along with 2 marlin in Costa Rica on Sandy’s boat, my wife, who also caught a sail, and with five other couples enjoying a terrific trip. Other than that, I really cannot say.

When I do think of my fishing experiences, these always vividly come to mind. My first fish, as many of you can relate, was a bluegill. This beast was caught while on a homemade wooden barge named Gumdrop near the Baptist Camp on the Peak Creek of Claytor Lake, VA. The first trout on a fly was in the headwaters of the very same Peak Creek, but at a much higher elevation. My home was within a riding-a-bicycle distance of either location. Do you think, even for a second, that I knew how good I had it? Of course, not. I was using my Father’s steel hexagonal rod with a basic 1950 +/- casting reel for my lake fishing adventures and could not have had more fun catching bluegills and perch. Some years later, I learned from my older and wiser friends, as well as Field and Stream in the barber shop, that trout were by far a superior species when compared to my current prey. Somewhere around 1965, I announced to my Father that the guys were going trout fishing on opening day, the first Saturday in April, with first lines in at noon. Having absorbed my brief but seemingly vast knowledge of trout fishing from the old magazines at the barber shop, I asked to use my Dad’s stiff-as-board early fiberglass fly rod, which was purchased at the Vance Store in downtown Pulaski, VA, on Washington Ave. I make a special note to mention the Vance Store for two reasons. First, that was the store where I first bought shotgun shells at $.10 each ( I mean, who could afford a box? And, by the way, try buying 3 shotgun shells at Walmart). Secondly, it was the Vance store where my Father purchased the first fiberglass boat in the area, and I watched four strong men carry it out the double front doors. Try buying a boat at your local hardware store today…Sorry, I digressed. It was on the Peak Creel that I caught, or was it snagged, a trout on a fly? Who can say for sure now, but it was landed, and one thing was certain: I was snagged for life.

One of my early memorable fishing experiences was created not by what I caught but by how I was caught. I wanted a Zebco 202 combo, which I assumed was the best fishing rod combination at the time because it was the most expensive combo sold at the local Rose’s store. To my great and unrelenting gratitude, I received it as my gift on my 15th birthday and convinced my older brother (which was difficult)) to drive me over to the lake. It was a beautiful April day with bright, warm sun and a few clouds, and I was drowning a minnow, something very close to pure bliss. Then, while sitting on a piling on the Lowman’s Ferry Bridge, I was almost immediately asked by a Virginia Game Warden for my fishing license, which was required of anyone 15 years or older. (Note to reader: my Dad was the county’s Clerk of the Circuit Court, where fishing licenses were sold at that time, geez!) Life can bring you immense joy, then kick you, you know where…quickly and without warning. But I talked myself out of my very first ticket, and over my many years, I honed it to a form of art, or at least, an economically valuable tool in my box.

Sixty-plus years have passed, and I remember these events as if they were only last year. I do know that my life has always had joyous times and memorable times while fishing. My first years with my Father and his friends on the Gumdrop and his boat with a fiberglass hull so thin that you could see light through it. Then, with my friends riding our bikes to fish, camp, and get out of town, forgetting that fishing was the purpose of the trip. As the years have passed, my sons and now my grandchildren, who seem to love catching bluegill and perch more than I ever did. While they count their fish, I count my blessings.