It started with Herring

Then Cutts

Went on the last fishing trip with this girl

We went ice fishing in may

and begins the rainbows

Then Linitk

thas the year of the dry fly

Goodbye island

Off to the Branch

Caught some Grayling

Dry fly fishing in August

Then the egg drop started

Went to Oregon

Went fishing with my dad

Winter Happened

Here’s

Fishing, its good for the soul, especially in December, especially after an extremely long fall.

January, February, March and April. That’s all that’s left of winter. I used to love winter, I still do I suppose, there is nothing like being out in the cold and feeling it bite against your skin, nothing like feeling the wind sting your face. It makes you feel so alive to feel the cold, like it is a living being embracing you. Looking out over the landscape that carved your soul, that feeds the rivers, that give nutrients to the ocean, that feed the plankton, which feed the herring, which feed the salmon, that feed the rivers, that feed the ocean. Standing where it all begins looking out over the reservoir of water waiting for spring to flood the trickles and turn the rivers into a shade of chocolate, watching the ravens soar in the afternoon, spotting a moose against the white of winter, then turning and letting gravity take you back to the real world, is something else.

Every moment has a lesson, and every mountain begs to make a moment. I remember one such moment, connecting with someone special, sitting on top of a mountain for what seems like hours, watching the light in her eyes, feeling happy, being at peace with who I was, feeling the week sun on my salty face, its moments like that which make winter special. The moment was over too soon we got up and left, wondered down the mountain ate lunch and went our ways. Almost six years later it seems like yesterday, I remember every emotion I felt, I remember the warmth of the sun, I remember the debate in my head. “Should I kiss her?” I thought to myself over and over again “Should I?”
“Yes go for it what do you have to lose?”
“No its a long ways down, you don’t want things to be weird”
“Do it”
“Don’t she’ll just reject you”
In the end I didn’t kiss her, I did nothing I sat there and talked, and quite frankly I was right.

That conversation plays in my head every time I meet someone new, that conversation reminds me that I can’t get what I don’t try for. Its all a risk, this whole living thing is risky I might get hurt, I might die young, I might be lonely and sad forever, I might not ever catch another fish. Tomorrow I could fall out of the raft, get stuck under an ice shelf and never make it back to the surface. Its all a risk. Should I have risked it then? Nope, hindsight says. My first kiss with a woman who I stayed with for four years was directly related to my not kissing that girl on the mountain. There I was scared out of my eighteen year old mind, faced with a similar situation and I thought back remembering my failure to act. No risk no reward, “Can I kiss you?” came out of my mouth, “I suppose,” was the response. So began a week when I was higher than I’ve ever been, so it began. Just like I have to die someday that relationship had to end, and just like death I tried hard to stave off the inevitable, and just like death will, the end caught up with me. We had some good times her and me.

As I roll on through winter I think I’ll have to go up that mountain again soon, I can’t relive that moment but I can at least visit the place most responsible for my happiness outside of the river. Tomorrow I can clear my mind of these thoughts, I drive them out with a river, and hopefully a trout. I can marvel in the beauty of the marine nitrogen transport that the salmon provide and love every frozen guide, every frozen foot, and every smile, every laugh, every mend, every bit of focus. I will feel the sun on my face and pretend it did anything more than shine.

I will have someone in my life who will make me happy again, I will, there will be someone to love me again, until then I need to make myself happy, and fishing makes me happy.

Tomorrow I’ll go fishing

Deflowering a new rod is one of the greatest joys of fishing. Today instead of waiting until spring to do the deed I went out to the only river that both had fish and wasn’t frozen, and for some reason I switched to a little caddis nymph I bought in Sisters to fish the Metolious and low and behold I caught a fish.

Today was a good day to be on the river

I’m getting on an airplane in a few hours, its about damn time. I live in Juneau Alaska, which is the capital city but as far as I’m concerned its a very very small town, especially if you are single and twenty something years old. Its like a soap opera, everybody dates every body else and so its impossible to not go after your friend’s ex or interest or whatever. Its time to get the hell away from all that, its just not healthy, they say in small towns like this you don’t loose your girlfriend you just lose you place in line. That sounds about right too me.

So tonight I’m going to the big city, a place where I can’t go into any bar and know a ton of people, a place where I can be anonymous, I’m really excited. Also the big city could possibly have trout within a three hour drive, and that certainly doesn’t hurt.

I’m addicted, hopelessly addicted, its like crack I can’t help myself, I’m neglecting my responsibilities. I neglect eating, sleeping, work, homework, kill relationships, yell at people, waste untold amounts of money all for what? For what? A fish is a fish is a fish, they are there swimming somewhere and I’ve caught thousands of them, why do I sit up in mid December, ignoring the pile of work on my desk to tie some flies that truth be told I will probably never throw because winter is so long. Why?

Why?

I wish I could give you a clear answer, I wish I could say “because this or that” but I can’t, I have no clue, they are just fish right?

My obsession has become an addiction, I cannot stop, I can not imagine a life that wasn’t based on where I was gonna fish next and with who. I make decisions about my career based on how I can catch the most trout for God’s sake. I drool over equipment, over hooks, over tools and feathers all winter, I obsess, talk about it to anyone who will listen. I can bullshit for days if given the chance, months even.

Yet when I step into the water it all becomes clear, its not about the fish, not about the fly, not about anything but myself, my friends and my world. I challenge myself, set clear goals, find moments of happiness, deal with frustration, deal with anger, deal with my demons, with ethics, with the kind of person I want to be. Everything I know comes from the river, every bit of peace I’ve had comes from the river. My first date with my first girlfriend was a trip to a river because that’s where I felt comfortable, that’s what I know, and the river knows me. Things become clear standing there staring at the waves, trying to decipher the code of the current, I don’t think about all these things anymore I just know. I know the person I am and the person I want to be, I know who my friends are, I know it all, just from the river.

Its December, that is a fact, winter officially starts this month, the sun starts coming back this month, and I’m going fishing this month. I used to think February was the worst month of the year because it goes by so slow, but I’m rethinking that, it might be December. “But its Christmas time!” you say. Well yea, Christmas is great, I’ll be happy to go home see my friends and family, freeze my ass off in a boat while the river freezes around me and celebrate the holiday’s or whatever. Yea I’ll ski, yea I’ll have a big bonfire on the winter solstice, and yea I’ll probably drink some good beer, eat some great food and hang out with some awesome folks. It doesn’t change the longing I have for something more, something special. Right now it seems I can’t have a special person in my life or even as the dude puts it a “fucking lady friend” so whats left, well there’s steelhead…

I’ve decided that the internet is the root of all evil in my life, without the internet I’d be a much better person, my human contact would consist of phone calls and talking instead of typing to a little avatar on a screen. More importantly I wouldn’t sit around and look at pictures of steelhead all day, and steelhead water, and steelhead flies, and everything else that comes with the internet. Tonight I am trying to figure out how to spend a bunch of money I don’t have, to chase fish that almost definitely aren’t in rivers that I’ve never seen let alone fished, let alone look like any water I’ve ever fished for steel in my life. Quite frankly it might be better if I was addicted to crack because at least then I could probably find it in Juneau, and I’d probably be less addicted. I’m addicted to steelheading and I’ve never caught a steelhead in a big river on the swing, I’ve never done it the right way. I’m always sight fishing in little coastal streams, looking for a player, fishing to a lot of fish. Its not my fault really, I’ve spent one day in steelhead country USA and I was alone and it was 110° out, not exactly weather conducive to catching fish, let alone hiking miles in a desert to find water to yourself (I went bass fishing that day). I’ve never used a two hander for steel, never caught one with a sink tip, I fish them like I fish trout mostly. Figure out what they are eating a present it as natural as I can.

Maybe I’m fooling myself, maybe I’m a trout fisherman and nothing more, but then again when I’m trout fishing I fish them like steelhead, swinging skaters and leaches on a two-hander, throwing big upstream mends and shit. Maybe everything is just backwards in this state, maybe I’m just rationalizing nymphing for steelhead. I don’t know, I like catching fish even if it means looking (and feeling) like an idiot. Shit I’ve even fished plastic for steel, but that was after a month strait of depleting the crap out of my fly box in the bush and all that was left were golf ball beads and pink san jaun worms (size 6 bubble gum = $$$$).

I am not some kind of steelhead genius, I am not a fish whisperer, hell I’ll say it, I pretty much suck at fishing, I’ve got a stream or two pretty dialed in but mostly I catch nothing and enjoy the hell out of it. I fish hard, I fish with dry flies when I can get away with it, and I don’t give a damn what anyone has to say about me because I have a great time doing it. I can catch the crap out of sockeye salmon, I have that system down pretty good, even without a gillnet, I’d probably rather just use a gillnet though, sockeye are boring.

So here I am a crappy fisherman, lonely as shit because the only girl I ever didn’t scare off broke my heart, the sun goes down at 3 in the afternoon, dreaming about going somewhere that will probably suck just as bad when I get there. I can’t help but wonder how bad its gonna be in February, hell I’m going fishing a week from tuesday, yup its gonna be cold, but its sure gonna be fun. I spent a long time away from my ex we were always working in different places over the summer, it turns out though that I lived for the summer, and I was just with her to pass the time until the steelhead return.

Let me tell you the story of the great boxer bear hunt of ’09. I was working on the bank of a very pretty river full of big mouse crazy trout. My work consisted of sitting in a tower and watching sockeye salmon swim by and counting them swimming by for eight hours a day. There were three people on my crew so we could count the salmon twenty four hours a day, seven days a week until they stopped running. Besides myself my crew consisted of a young lady we’ll call her Jane and an old guy I’ll call Joe. I had the night shift from 8 P.M. to 4 A.M. then Jane went from 4 until noon and Joe “worked” from noon until I came on at eight. As you can imagine weird shifts like that make for very weird sleep schedules and some very cranky people around camp.

Camp consisted of two tents on platforms, one with food and our office and one that we slept in. A little ways upriver from the tents we had a tower and our boats, across the river there was another tower, being on a productive salmon stream in southwest Alaska camp is bisected by many game trails, of course up here, game does not mean deer or elk, it means bears. The bears have been wondering on this river longer than anything else and in places where the bank is stable they leave their mark in the form of smooth packed dirt trails eons old. I am no stranger to bears, this is my fifth year living in bear country for the summer, three of those seasons I lived in a tent. Bears are like any other critter, you leave them alone and they leave you alone for the most part. We are not food for them, we are fairly protected in our tents and there is always someone up to watch the food tent. They wonder through camp traveling from here to there, but they have never once bothered us, well at least bothered me.

This season I would usually sleep from 4 in the morning until the tent was too hot to sleep in anymore around one or two, so here it is, just past noon, I’m sleeping, Jane is passed out after a long morning shift and Joe is up in the tower reading or whatever he did when he was suppose to be working. All of a sudden I am awakened to shouts from across the river, which I typically ignore because I’m trying to teach Joe (who’s 40 with a PhD) how to do stuff for himself instead of calling for me to bail him out every time the motor is in gear and he can’t start it. Today is different though, his shouts were urgent “BEAR BEAR BEAR” I hear him yell. I probably cuss a bit and grudgingly slip into my shoes with bleary eyes. Jane wakes up and looks at me and probably says something then tries to go back to sleep.

I grab the shotgun and load it with firecrackers and a few slugs just to be safe. I like bears don’t get me wrong but when you live in a tent in the middle of bear country you must defend your territory as much as you can so you aren’t afraid of getting mauled walking to the tower in the middle of the night. The way we do that is firecrackers that are shot out of a shotgun. I rub the gunk from my eyes as I exit the tent, alert, prepared and naked, except my rubber boots and my boxers, gun is drawn safety is off. I look, no bear, I go around the other tent, no bear, look on the trail, no bear. Now when I can’t see a bear that I know is around it unnerves me. I yell across the river, “wheres the bear Joe.”

He yells back, “Across the river.” Great I think to myself, I probably would have run across the river and shot the firecracker at Joe if it had been on his side.

I ask again, “where is the bear,” but most likely with more expletives.

“He was on the trail by the tin shack walking your way.” I cuss under my breath, I just got woken up for a bear walking towards camp that was over a quarter mile away. Well I’m up I might as well chase the stupid thing and assert my dominance to show him our camp is not a safe place to be. “Where is he now,” I yell, Joe describes how the bear went into the woods so it could avoid our camp (why’d you wake me up again Joe?) and I head off in that direction.

Now I’d like to say I rolled in the mud got myself good and dirty and stalked the bear and shot it with the firecracker while yelling some sort of war cry. Nothing of the sort happened, I did wonder around in the woods for a while, I wanted to stalk that bear, prove myself to be a hunter or something but I never did see it. I just got eaten by mosquitoes and made Jane laugh because I was wondering around in my boxers with a shotgun getting eaten by bugs. And that is the Great Boxer Bear Hunt of ’09.

Tomorrow I’m going skiing for the second time this year, the first time alpine skiing. I love skiing, next to fishing it is one of the things I like to do best. The feeling that you have at the bottom of a run full of fresh deep perfect snow is pretty much unmatched. I think its the pursuit of perfection that keeps me going, the pursuit of the perfect moment. Just like fishing I am looking for perfection.

Tomorrow marks a beginning of sorts, it is the first time I going downhill skiing since my big breakup, I didn’t ski to much when I was with her, I don’t know what it was that made me stop. Perhaps its because I was unhappy with leaving her behind, perhaps it was that a warm bed with a beautiful woman in it is much more appealing Saturday morning than a cold car and punishing wind. At any rate I just about quit, I quit doing one of the things I loved to do most, and as it turns out not having skiing in my life made me unhappy. So I’m going tomorrow, I’m ignoring everything else and getting some turns in under hopefully clear blue skies.

Fresh out of the kiln
Salmon Bowl

Coachman Cup

Life Cycle Bowl

Steelhead Bowl