I was asked the other
day where I have been all summer.
I’d like to say I’ve
been fishing like a mad man since the season began and tell some epic story of
hero casts and double digit days.
But I can’t.
I wish I could post
up pictures of the thousands of flies I’ve tied since the spring.
But I haven’t.
Life gets busy. As
much as you want to and try to stay on a certain course, falling off the rhumb
line happens quickly in unsettled weather. Course correction is influenced by
things you can’t necessarily control. Destinations change. It is a constant
juggling act living one life posing as a happy idiot in the struggle for the
legal tender and the other as a happy idiot waste deep in a backwater creek
seeking adventure. Someday I’ll get it right.
But for now other
things and other people can wait. My daughter moved home in June after a year
away. She will begin high school in two weeks, back in her hometown, back with
her friends. The summer has been spent making up for lost time and preparing
for the start of a new journey, a new adventure. For both of us.
Abby’s talent in art
has led her to photography, an interest we both share and something she has
suggested on her own that might fit well with the fly-water side of our lives. During
our travels this summer she has brought her camera gear along to capture
whatever might be encountered. It has been fascinating not just watching her as
she photographs different things but more so in listening to her explain what
she saw or what she was thinking when she took each shot. These thoughts are as
interesting to me as the actual photograph.
We’ve worked on a
couple of photograph projects since she came home. One of which was submitting
some of her pictures in the photography contest at the Marshfield Fair. It’s
not Nat Geo, I know, but it is a start. Abby spent a week going through all her
shots and chose four to submit. She was gone last weekend when the fair opened
so I went down by myself to see how she had done. I have to say I was a very
proud father as I walked through the exhibit.
The ribbons aside, I
am proud of Ab for taking something she loves and putting it and herself out
there. That is adventure.
Now begins the
subtle suggestion of places to visit for great photography like the Low
Country, Cudjoe, Baja, NOLO, the Bow, the Dean…
PS: Fishing to
resume soon.
North River, MA
21 August 2014