Its Halloween today, I haven’t really cared about Halloween for a long time, let alone dressed up, I wish I could be Brad Pitt for Halloween, from a river runs through it, but I’m not sure anyone would get it, and quite frankly I’m too ugly for that to work.

I have a lot of faith in certain flies, it takes faith to be a good fly fishermen.  The day that I lose the faith that a fish will bite is the day I need to quit this sport and try something else.  Its hard to have faith sometimes, sometimes you feel that the waters are barren, that even if you had the juiciest salmon eggs nothing would eat your fly.  Sometimes though you catch fish in the weirdest places.  Its hard to fish when you are hopeless.  Sometimes I am hopeless, sometimes I think nothing will rise.  I just want to feel connected again, I have to realize the summer will come, and with it new adventures.  Its hard to realize though, its hard to imagine the summer when the fall and winter are so cold.  It will come, some days I have no clue how, but it will.

Look at this its only October and I’m already sitting around waiting.  I have to wait there’s nothing else left to do but wait, and scheme, the scheming keeps me going.  I’ve got trips planned with not enough time to really do what I want to, I’ve got miles to drive people to see, flies to tie, equipment to buy, beers to drink, schemes to hatch and a whole bunch of other crazy things before I can get up in the morning and say “today I get what I really want.”  I waited a long time for some things to happen and now that they are over its crazy to think how good they were, crazy to think that just a short time ago I was pinching myself because all of my dreams have come true.  Now darkness is descending on the north and all of my dreams are once again thrown into the realm of fantasy.  I don’t know what I want anymore, I thought I had everything, but seasons change.

The dream is still there, the dream is attainable, the dream will be realized again, not one of them is too big.  Some dreams are worth the blood, the sweat, the tears.  The dream I shared with someone special for almost a fifth of my life was worth every tear I cried before and every one I cried since, and every tear I’ve yet to shed.  Now that she’s gone I have a chance to live my other dreams, go on adventures with new people to new places.  Yet the dream remains the same, to love and be loved, there is no dream worth any more, and it is a dream worth waiting for.  I love the trout, and if the trout were capable of love, even though I cause them great pain (if they were capable of feeling pain) I’m sure that they’d love me for fighting for them for being there for them, for not sharing all of their secretes for not treating them like two bit whores, you should treat a trout like you should treat a woman, and while we all fail in that endeavor once in a while, we should never forget what the true goal is. Sometimes I forget to thank every fish I catch for spending some time with me and making me feel good, sometimes I kill the fish unceremoniously and treat it like currency, like a five dollar bill, but I cannot forget to take a moment to reflect on the amazing things that fish do for us.  Fish give me life, and there is nothing more amazing than that.  The scientist in me says that fish are just fulfilling a role in an ecosystem that they evolved to fill, but the artist in me says that fish were put on this earth to fulfill the souls and bodies of earth’s inhabitants.  Perhaps this is the reason I cannot discount the idea of God, fate, or anything else, because so much in this world makes me happy, and pure science cannot explain that happiness.

Since I’ve been waiting its been really hard to be happy, I try sometimes, and sometimes I just give up and let the pain take over and dictate my life, let it control who I am.  It makes me do things that I should never think about, my demons are definitely alive and well on some nights.  Some nights there’s nothing I want to do more than roll over and play dead for a while, see if anyone notices, see if anyone cares, I know people do, they just have a funny way of showing it sometimes.  I guess that why I’m still here, to fulfill the souls of others, to care for those who care for me.  Its why I am passionate about life, and about love, its why I fight hard for what I want and what I believe in.  Perhaps not hard enough say some people, but if life has taught me anything you shouldn’t put all your cards on the table at once, you should wait.  And waiting is the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life, you just want everything to happen now.  But if everything happened at once what would happen tomorrow?  What would be worth waiting for then?

I often wonder if I would fish if not for the ever changing seasons, if not for the constant waiting, I’m not sure I would, I might get bored, I’d definitely run out of flies.  The salmon make us wait, the rivers freeze, the summer ends, it happens.  Right now I’m waiting for someone to come along, who that is I don’t know, the great thing about women is that you don’t have to trick them into biting, they know exactly what they are doing.  Sometimes I feel bad for the fish, tricking them with fur and feathers seems so mean, piercing their lip and scaring the crap out them is just insanely mean.  What chance do they have?  Quite a bit apparently… At least that’s what my friends who fish with me seem to think.  Someday the rivers will thaw, the steelhead will arrive, and I’ll have my tent on the bank of the river and I’ll be loving the crap out of the fish and who knows maybe a lucky lady too, but I won’t pierce her lip, lip rings are a turn off, cause sometimes I’m the fish too, until then I just gotta wait and make the best of it.

Some times you catch the fish of the day when you aren’t paying any attention you are talking to your buddy, looking at the scenery, walking back across the river with your fly dangling or any number of things, you just react and it happens.  Some days though you work hard, put in your dues, play it right and everything comes together.  More often for me though when I don’t try good things happen.

When I’m obsessed with one fish that I see, I almost never catch it.  I sit for hours try to pick out the fly, and it just sits there and doesn’t spook but doesn’t eat so I switch tippets, do everything right and it doesn’t eat.  Every once in a great while it does though, so I just keep trying.  When I think about my life, every little detail and every little decision I make can be related to something in trout fishing, its too bad I’m a much better trout fisherman than I am at life.  Although I do think I understand women better than trout, but that’s what keeps going back to the river.

I’m a person who takes things probably way to seriously, I’m intense you might say.  I can’t just let things go, I can’t sit in one place on the river and hope a fish will swim by, I have to walk, I have to find that fish.  I think that’s probably why I’m such a terrible hunter I have to go looking for thing and I make a lot of noise.  I don’t change flies much, I don’t do anything more than walk and find a willing trout. I think the fact that I take things seriously is the best thing about me, I think its a quality that few have.

Living here in Juneau I’m stuck, there is nowhere to walk to, unless I want to brave the ice field then packraft across a huge lake to get to Atlin.  That would be a really long walk and what I’m looking for really isn’t there.  I’m looking for that next rising fish, that next one that comes up and take my offering. I fish that fly with confidence, who can resist?  Maybe I should switch flies once in a while, maybe I should stop fishing for a while get perspective on live, and not take that last one that got away so seriously.  That fish will be etched in my memory forever, it will and the heartbreak of watching the fly come out will last, but I will know that she’ll be there again for me someday, if I make the right mend, if I throw the right fly, it’ll all come together.  I can’t chase that fish, I have to go find a new one, the great thing about fishing big rivers is you don’t see the fish, things happen totally by surprise, and they come out of the strangest places.  Maybe in my fishing I should switch venues from the small spring creek where every fish is as visible as day to a big river, where even the worst anglers can find what they are looking for.  I love the small streams though, I love the challenge, I love the chase, I love the satisfaction of a fish eating after refusal and refusal.  My fish will eat, I put her down, yea, I’ll be back tomorrow with a bit more stealth, and bit different of a fly and throw the right cast and make the right mend and bam.  It’ll happen, and if not with her it will with the next one up stream.

Lately I’ve been thinking about what I want in life.  I want to wake up in a tent on a crisp fall morning with a river nearby, and nothing to do but get up and fish.  I want to wake up next to someone special who has just as much zest for life as me.  I miss the fall, I miss just being with people.  I’m constantly alone, even in my Job, you sit on the tower alone, you often cook and eat alone, you stay up all night alone and you sleep alone.  I’m sick of being alone, I’m sick of my friends being spread so thin it would cost me thousands of dollars just to visit them all.  I’m sick of fishing by myself, yea its good for a day or two, or an outing, being one with the river.  There is nothing like watching your buddy hook up on a fish of their lifetime.  Last summer I can count the times on one hand I fished with another person, like seriously fished with them.  I went fishing by myself every day for weeks at a time, it was fine, I guess.

Maybe I should get a dog, the dog will be there with me no matter what, but then what kind of person would I be if I had to take a dog all around in this crazy lifestyle I live.  What if I ran out of money and couldn’t feed it?  Who would take care of it when I was away?  Dogs are much more loyal than people are, but they can’t take care of themselves when you go.

The weather here is crappy and there are no good trout streams.  Maybe I’ll blow up the tube and fish a lake, maybe I’ll sit and watch hockey today.  I just have to wait, wait for Christmas when I can see my friends, wait for spring when I can fish again.  See if I can banish old memories to the place they deserve and make new ones.

In the mean time I’m stuck here wanting things, I guess its better to want things then to want nothing, cause if you want nothing, why the hell are you even alive?

How come there aren’t that many songs about fishing, especially serious ones?  I feel like fishing and music go hand in hand, what with the music of the river and the line ripping off the reel and the fish jumping.  Why doesn’t someone who is better at music than I am write some good songs.  A few songs off the top on my head that are really good – Fishing With Bill, by Greg Brown, Madison Brown, by The Growling Old Men, Ice Fishing, by Bill Morrissey (although its not really about ice fishing).  I was actually the first person to take Bill ice fishing, we got totally skunked and I forgot the ice scooper, I got to miss school though, I think I was like 11 at the time.  I think the reason there isn’t much fishing music out there is that when you start writing a song about fish it just seems so cheesey, like every upbeat love song, only with fishing only like 3% of people in the world will understand whereas everyone experiences heartbreak.  Maybe I’ll write a good one some day.

Only 6 months of winter left… Its gonna be a long ride.

Today I worked a bunch on my life cycle bowl, its looking pretty sweet I think.  I’ll post some pictures when I finish it up.  Pottery in a way is a lot like fly tying, they are both useful crafts.  When tying flies you make things that could potentially get you food (although I release most of my fish) and with pottery you are making stuff that can then hold or store that food.  I’d even bet that the use of a hook to catch fish and pottery evolved at about the same time probably in different places though, firing kilns in Southeast Alaska with just wet wood is a huge pain in the ass.

Today in chemistry I was sitting and not really paying attention, well paying attention enough to glance at the cute girl next to me when something especially confusing came up and rolling my eyes at her and her smiling back.  Yea I know this is a fishing blog, not a girls blog, but I’m getting there.  So anyway we were talking about how smog basically ends up setting up the next day’s smog event.  It made me think of salmon, you know cycles and stuff, and of a bowl I’m making.  Yes I’m a potter, I make pottery, and I’m damn proud of it, its a super manly thing to do damnit! Anyway I’m making a bowl with the life stages of salmon wrapped around from egg to adult and then they last adults will be laying the eggs to start things again, sorta like smog only way way way better.

Its amazing how easily my mind is directed towards fish, I don’t know what it is about them, its not that they are mysterious, I think they are easier to observe than just about any animal, just find the water and you are golden.  I think its because you can touch them so easy, I mean I’ve caught salmon with my bare hands.  Heck just to touch the water they live in and see them is amazing, the true amazing thing is the ability to take some feathers and some fur and make something that looks like a bug and end up holding another living, wild thing in your hand.  Sure you can do that with a tree or a flower, but holding a wild animal is like holding the mountains or the sky, somewhat unattainable, especially with terrestrial animals where you end up getting clawed, bitten, or the critters wind up dead.  The absolute beauty of fish and fly fishing is that you can hold that wild animal in your hands for a brief second and release that fish back like nothing has happened.  You love it so you let it go, let someone else love it, and as long as they too respect it, that fish might be there for you again someday.  There is a literal connection with nature when fishing, from the hook is the line which is attached to the reel which is on the rod which is attached to you.  The connection is there, and that is a beautiful thing.

Nowadays its easy to get lost in the hype, in the glory, in the money shots, in everything, in thinking about fishing, thinking about your attitude on the river, thinking about what you really want.  But when I’m fishing, I don’t care whether the fish is 6 inches or 60 I just want to be connected to nature, literally, and that’s why I can’t focus in chemistry, that and the girl next to me has pretty eyes.  I hope she doesn’t read this or I might be in trouble.

Its over, I just gotta admit it, I keep deluding myself by tying flies that I say are for fall run bluebacks and post spawn dollies, I know where they go for the winter, they must pass some places to get there between now and winter, right?  Fishing has had less meaning for some reason lately, my girlfriend of four years dumped me recently, not in a good way either, we’ll just leave it at that she is a coward and screwed me over because of it.  At least I know that summer will return again, she probably never will, I saw her with some guy today, fatter than me, which is hard to do, he probably fishes with bait, whatever, if she wants to date a fat bait fisherman fine, its what she deserves.  In the mean time the silvers are red, and the dollies have all but disappeared and my car broke down, and because I was an idiot and lent my ex money I don’t have that money to fix my car (not that I would anyway, extra money around here ends up in guns and fly rods immediately).  She’ll pay me back someday, but between now and then I’m stuck, no bike even, what the hell was I thinking not bringing my bike down?  Anyway I wish I had some time and money, there are steelhead somewhere and I want to find them, steelhead are something me and her never shared, I can’t fish for salmon anymore, I’m sure not gonna release them to die before they spawn and I don’t eat that junk, when you’ve caught as many salmon as me, you think of them as currency and dog food, I’m not bragging about how many salmon I’ve caught, its just my job to catch salmon.

Steelhead are an ideal something I can want, something I can dream about, and I have no memories of her and steelhead, nothing there to prevent me from enjoying my fantasies.  If this new girl pans out, which probably won’t happen, I probably will take her steelheading, that’ll probably turn out to be a mistake.  Who knows? steelhead won’t be anywhere near here till May and I’ll probably be gone from here by then.  And hell, if she decides to take a risk on me and I teach her to fish and she gets as addicted as I am, well that would be the dream right there right?

Actually I have a hunch about insane steelheading about a two hour boat ride from here, that’s probably going off right now, dropping temps probably cleared the water.  Nobody knows if they are there or not, or its a closely guarded secrete, if anyone on the interweb asks me where I’m talking about they should have their fingers cut off cause I am sure as hell not telling, unless they have a jet boat or helicopter and a few days.

Every once in a while I’ll be driving down the road and the weather will be normal (horrible) and I’ll think to myself “why the hell do I live here? I could live anywhere,”  The answer of course is school, I gotta finish my degree and stuff, get on track for a career or something, honestly I want all of that, the house, the family, the financial independence to be able to book a guide so I don’t get skunked every time I try to fish anywhere out of state, or to buy a boat so I can get to this steelhead nirvana I imagine.

Why am I so caught up on steelhead?  There are plenty of other fish out there, probably the same reason I’m caught up on one girl.  Maybe I should calm down a bit, not go for the pinnacle of the sport while I’m so young, heck maybe I shouldn’t be looking for a girl who’s worthy of a steelhead trip while I’m so young, the girl that is single and knows how to spey cast could be around the next corner on the river.  I just need to  be somewhere where there are some freaking rivers that warrant a two hander.  Girls are tricky they have brains and minds of their own, the good ones do anyway, they don’t just go for the first shiney thing that comes their way and get hooked.  If they did life would be a bit easier, I can be pretty shiney sometimes.

A good girl is like that perfect trout, the one I imagined my whole life, sometimes I feel like everybody else gets to catch that fish all the time, you know the one, the one you see rise out of the corner of your eye, you inspect the water and notice some blue winged olives are just starting to come off so you switch to a size 16 dun and make a cast and the fish comes and takes it, you play it out and hold it in your hand, its about 18 inches, perfect, not so big its ugly but not so small its hard to hold, like a perfect pair of breasts.  You smile and note that it doesn’t have scars in its mouth, it looks untouched by another man, this river is a busy one and you are sure it has, a fish this big doesn’t live that long without taking a fly, but today it took yours and that makes you happy and you can forget all the others who have touched this piece of nature.

I came close to the perfect fish, I came close to the perfect woman, the perfect fish is easier to describe so I’ll start there.  I was motoring up my river showing the new folks around when I came ripping around this log jam and ran into a gravel bar that wasn’t there the season before, oops way to impress the new guys.  Anyway I was pulling some gravel out of the grate on the jet pump when I noticed a fish rise, since it was still mid June I figured the rise was either a grayling or a rainbow eating smolt.  I threw a bomber first and swung it in there, the water was fast, really fast, not great trout water, for the life of me I have no idea why that hole was productive last season, its not even a hole really.  Anyway nothing looked at the bomber, so I switched to a smolt and stripped it like a dancer with tuition and a mortgage to pay, still nothing, these must be grayling I think as I ponder my next move.  I keep looking at the water for the answer and then there it was, a mayfly, teeny between 16 and 18, dark, lets see, dry box, the smallest mayfly I have with me is a size 10 green wulf, great… I throw, do a little drop downstream, throw a weird mend let it drift below me, drift, swing a bit, recast, drift, fish, set, nothing, fish rising across a seam, throw, nothing, throw, nothing, crazy mend, can’t get a good drift, I suck at fishing, throw below me again, take, set, on, strip, reel, reel, back up, net, yes! 18″ of dead drift eating rainbow, picture put him back, I’m buzzing.  That fish across the seam rises again, throw, mend, throw, mend, throw, mend, take, set, on!   Downstream, nothing I can do but muscle him out of the trees, 3x seems to small, side pressure, back up, out of the trees, I’m on gravel, back up, reel reel reel, run, net, head up, scoop, yes.  25″ picture put him back.  I can hardly breathe the only thing I can compare it too was my first kiss, which honestly was better, I was buzzed for a week. I was high as a 14 year old with his wisdom teeth fresh out and a nice stash of pills to edge the pain.  No drugs involved for me though, just a $500 plane ticket, a bush plane flight, back breaking work getting camp together, and a messed crappy driving decision.  That fish was almost perfect, it was to eager, to easy, it took a fly that was a few sizes off and the wrong color.  I didn’t care at the time though, just like my ex, she was easy, it took nothing to coax her to rise and while I was with her I didn’t care that she wasn’t perfect, I was just happy for that moment, I had no reason to make things more perfect.  I’ll find my perfect fish, and when I do I’ll feel good for a little bit, when I find that perfect girl though I’ll feel good forever.  Good thing girls don’t disappear for the winter, I should start tying some flies for them, I just have no clue what they take, and I doubt its reverse spiders.