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Leaning Curve



Sometimes the fishing is much better than the catching.  So it was when I took my brother-in-law to Timothy Lake this week.  Ever the purist, I kicked along on my float tube, casting my fly rod between stumps, next to logs and up against reeds.  I tried a few dry flies but mostly it was drifting a nymph or stripping a streamer, or both.  Nobody home.  Not even some mild interest my offerings.
Bro' John, on the other hand, slipped over the water in his kayak and took 3 fish on his spinning reel outfit.  Using mostly shiny silver spinners, both rainbows and brookies were impressed.  "Nice place you got here," he yelled across the lake at me as we both took a break from watching a pair of osprey do a mating dance about 500 feet above. 
Oh I know there will be other days and other lakes and rivers and streams and tail-waters, and fly fishing only places and many more times, but for a minute there, I was much too downcast for such a beautiful day.
It's always so unpredictable, with mystery the only guarantee, ever.  I wouldn't want it another way.  
Someday I'm going to just take a week or two and hang out on a lake or stream all day.  Each day will teach me more and more.  Then, when I return after dark winters, I'll be able to embrace my fate more fully.  Up the learning curve they call it.

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