My mother’s family lived in a small town in central Wisconsin. My Grandfather moved the family there somewhere around 1920. Grandpa started a hardware store and ran it with his brother until he retired in his 90s. The memories I have from visits to the homestead and small town with my family in the early 1970s led to the setting for this story. All characters are fictional. I believe that the old story of boy gets fish, or man conquers nature have been done to death, so I thought I would put a bit of a twist in this tale.
Copyright 2010, Erik F. Helm
Coming of age.
Ronnie’s converse high-tops pattered and thumped against the pavement as he rounded the corner of Oak Street at full tilt and turned onto Division. His canvas newspaper satchel with the Courier logo in bold letters bounced against his hip to the rhythm of his legs. He was running from old man Hebert’s bullmastiff. The huge dog was Ronnie’s nemesis. It lay in wait in the bushes or behind the garbage cans until he opened the screen door to Mr. Hebert’s house to deliver the paper, and then chased Ronnie all the way to the corner. This game had been going on for months.
Although Ronnie was running from the dog, (anyone could see that) he also had a hidden agenda; for standing in the middle of Division Street was Theisen Brothers Hardware, and in the window was the latest object of Ronnie’s dreams; a fishing pole.
Ronnie slowed a bit as he approached the shop, and for the hundredth time that summer, tilted his ball-cap back, and cupping his hands to the side of his head, peered in the large display window. The pole was standing next to a wicker fishing creel, a softball and bat, and several bins of nails. Between Kerberg’s five and dime, and Theisen Brothers, A kid could find everything he desired, and more.
As he always did, Ronnie dug deep into his front jean pockets, and pulled out his collection money from the newspaper route. Forty-three cents: half of which would have to be turned over to his mother when he arrived home. Minus Bazooka Joe gum, a pack of baseball cards, and the Saturday afternoon gangster film at the Aurora, he might add another nickel to the money he had stashed under the old squirrel’s nest in his tree house.
Ronnie knew it was a fly-fishing pole. He knew this for a sacred fact because of the Abercrombie and Fitch catalogue from 1942 that he had found in the trash along the curb on his paper route. In the long evenings and rare occasions when Ronnie, Joe, and Fatty Smith were not throwing crab apples or swapping comic books, Ronnie could be found in the tree-house savoring a warm piece of corn bread, eyes glued to the pages of the catalogue, and dreaming of what it might feel like to catch a fish.
Not that Ronnie had never been fishing. Indeed, he had been fishing twice with his father. Once when he was just old enough to remember getting his jeans and sneakers full of mud and receiving a spanking, and the last time Dad had been home on leave from Germany before, well… before that day the telegram arrived and Mother had cried. Dad had caught a few bullheads from Stoker’s Pond, but Ronnie just lost his worm and corn to nibblers.
Ronnie knew he didn’t need a fly pole to catch a fish. He had Dad’s old cane crappie pole in the shed, but Ronnie possessed a secret so precious that he wouldn’t even tell it to Fatty or Joe.
On a stifling July evening so typical of a Wisconsin summer, Ronnie took off after his supper to try to find some relief from the heat by swimming in Stoker’s Pond. He had had to endure the endless cautions and fussing from his mother before he was free. Mom had changed, he thought, in the months since Dad had ‘gone away’. She just seemed so much more protective.
He was seated with his bare feet dipped in the tepid water, reading a Hardy Boys mystery he had traded with Fatty for a broken cap-gun, when the pond was disturbed by rings and splashes at the surface of the water. Strange bugs like the ones that gathered around the streetlights downtown suddenly filled the air. Ronnie slapped at his ear, and looking at his hand, found an insect with clear upright wings, an elongated body, antenna, and long tails trailing behind it. The town kids, who delighted in stomping on the flies when they became disoriented or hit the glass bell of the streetlamp and fell to the curb, called them ‘crush-bugs’. Ronnie knew they were Mayflies. He also knew, thanks to the Abercrombie and Fitch catalogue, that they hatched out of the water in rivers and lakes. Now he knew something else too; that the mayflies that he and the other kids had just assumed appeared out of thin air, attracted by the mating call of the incandescent light, had an origin, and he had found it less than a mile from his house.
Although Ronnie may have had trouble with his math homework from time to time, he was not slow. It took him a grand total of five seconds to put two and two together and realize that the carp in Stoker’s pond, some of which, to his youthful imagination, he thought must have weighed more than a hundred pounds, were feeding on the mayflies at the surface, and making a messy feast of it at that.
He was down at the pond the next evening with Dad’s crappie pole, and the mayflies were back. The carp were circling lazily on the surface, sucking down the easy and tasty bugs. He rigged up the pole and chose the smallest hook in the old chewing tobacco tin his dad used to store his tackle. He caught a mayfly, and carefully placing it on the hook, heaved it out as far as the length of gut would take it.
It was if someone had suddenly pulled some magical switch. One second the carp were at the surface, and the next they simply disappeared. Ronnie looked for his bait. It too had sunk. It, and the sloppy cast had put all of the big fish off their evening meal. For the next week, he tried corn, worms, grasshoppers, stale liverwurst, and a ball of mushy dough, but the notoriously spooky and selective carp would have none of it.
That was last year, and by now, Ronnie had devised a plan for catching the big carp. The secret, as he had learned from his catalogue, was a floating mayfly imitation on a tiny hook, and the only way to make this work was the fly fishing pole: the very one that now teased him from Theisen Brothers’ window, the very one that he saved his paper-route pennies for and could never tell his mom about.
At first, he thought of telling her of his desire, but Mom was a girl. She understood magical things about carrots, naphtha soap, cabbage, and how to get chocolate stains out of Ronnie’s Sunday church shirt, but she could never understand about tadpoles, carp, jack knives, or why he would need a fly-fishing pole. For his birthday that spring, she baked him a cake, gave him a hand-knitted sweater too large for him, a new pair of sneakers from Kerberg’s, and sent him to a double feature at the Aurora. No, Ronnie would have to keep the secret to himself for now.
He calculated that with his meager savings, even if he cut back on the gum and skipped the weekly cinema film; he would still be a bit short on the price of the fly rod by the critical time for the mayfly hatch.
Providence sometimes intervenes, and it does so in its greatest effect in childhood. Ronnie had completed his paper route that happy Friday afternoon, when the elderly Mrs. Thompson came out of Abel’s grocery store with a large bag of produce and breathlessly asked if Ronnie could help her carry them home. He consented happily, and after setting down the bag in Mrs. Thompson’s kitchen, was asked if he would be willing to help her every Friday, and with a few chores around the house as well. She was getting on in years she explained, and it would her happy to have the company as well as the help. Reaching into her purse, the ancient lady extracted a quarter and smiling, handed it to Ronnie. Like everything about Mrs. Thompson, the quarter smelled like baby powder, but it was his now. He quickly agreed to the job, and clutching the quarter, ran for home.
A week later, he marched into Theisen brothers with his head held high and his eyes wide.
“Well hello young man, how may I help you?” asked William, the taller of the brothers and the more friendly.
Ronnie got right to the point.
“I want to buy that fly rod in the window,” he stated with eager anticipation.
“Well, now…” said Mr. Theisen, “That is a fine rod for a young boy, a model made in Indiana if I am not mistaken. She runs two dollars and a quarter,” he stated with raised eyebrows. “Sure you don’t want one of these cheaper poles over here?” he asked pointing to some crooked telescoping steel rods displayed under the brand ‘Catch More!’
“Nope, just the one in the window,” Ronnie replied.
Mr. Theisen carefully removed the fly rod from the window, gave it a dusting, separated it into two pieces, and wrapped it in yellow butcher’s paper.
Ronnie selected a dozen of the smaller tan flies from a bin by the counter, and laying them next to the rod on the counter, placed his pile of coins next to them.
“Well, young man, will you be needing a reel and line with the rod, or do you already have them?” Mr. Theisen asked.
Somehow, in all his planning, Ronnie had thought the rod came with everything. He was so fixated on the fly rod itself that it had never occurred to him that a separate reel and line would be needed.
“Um, well… How much are they?” he asked in trepidation.
“Well son, the reel we got to match this rod is a dollar, and the line and gut are fifty cents.”
Ronnie, who all this time was almost hovering above the wooden floor in excitement, suddenly felt deflated. The dreams of the carp were vanishing before his very eyes.
He began pulling out his pockets, unearthing a sour apple, a screw, a broken pocketknife, and three pennies.
At that moment, William Theisen remembered what it was like to be ten years old and to want something more than life itself. In his case, it had been a catcher’s mitt.
“Say… son, can you hold on a minute? Let me look in the storage room, I think I might have something there for you.”
He returned in less than a minute with an old tarnished and rusty reel that was still attached to a broken rod. Mr. Theisen carefully placed a chisel against the rod fragment and with the single tap from a wooden mallet, freed the reel.
He handed it to Ronnie.
“Here you go, son,” he said, placing the reel in Ronnie’s outstretched hands.
“It is a bit bent and rusty, but a bit of an oiling will fix it up nicely. The line is in serviceable shape too. It should work just fine.”
“How much?” Ronnie asked, not grasping the intention of the moment.
“What you have here will just cover it,” Mr. Theisen said smiling. He pushed his glasses onto the top of his head and placed the coins in the register.
“Not a word though, son. Can’t have folks thinking we just give things away,” he stated with a wink.
That evening after supper, and with his math practice completed and delivered to his mother, Ronnie ran to the tree house and assembled the rod, reel, and line. The reel was a bit bent, and even after oiling, would squeak and grind when the handle was turned. It didn’t matter though, it worked. That was the point. He carefully ran his hands down the intermediate red wraps on the cane rod, and sighted down its length, just like the man in the Norman Rockwell print from the cover of The Saturday Evening Post that he had saved, and which now hung by several nails in his tree-house.
It was sort of straight. Not perfect, but not too bad, he thought. He attached the gut, and stored the flies in an old cough-drop tin. He was all ready for tomorrow. He hid the rod under some old comic books in the corner, and went in to listen to the radio. His mother didn’t even have to remind him to wash his face. He was asleep in minutes that night, dancing mayflies filling his head.
All day long on that Friday that he and Stoker’s pond had a date, Ronnie had difficulty concentrating. He delivered papers to the wrong houses, barely escaped Mr. Hebert’s dog, and poked at his chores. He ate his dinner so fast that his mother had to warn him three times that he was going to give himself a stomachache.
After helping dry the dishes, he was excused for the rest of the evening. The screen door banged on its hinges as he made the dust fly running to the tree house.
The sun was just touching the tops of the trees that lined the far edge of the pond when Ronnie arrived. Standing well back from the water, he assembled the rod, attached the reel, and strung the line through the guides. He reckoned that he had around half an hour before the bugs started hatching, so he decided to try a practice cast or two in the clearing where the townspeople parked their Fords.
At first, it was as if the rod had a mind of its own. Whatever Ronnie intended to do, the rod would just not cooperate. It was like learning to ride a bike, he thought, as he tangled the line around his head. The harder he tried, the worse it got. Finally, he sat down in the grass and tears of frustration began to well in the corner of his eyes.
Then he remembered something he had read in one of his trips to the library. It was something about casting slowly and stopping the rod, something about loops. He stood up and tried again. This time, to his delight, the slower motion of the rod caused it to bend and unbend, and the line went forward and fell in a heap. After a few minutes more, Ronnie was able to make the line turn over and land the gut gently twenty feet from him. It would be enough, he thought, to place a fly in front of those carp.
Looking up at the gathering dusk while wiping away the remnants of his tears, Ronnie noticed the first mayflies over the water. They seemed to coming from the surrounding trees instead of the water, Puzzled, he peered through the tall grasses at the surface of the pond. To his eye, there seemed to be two colors of mayflies, some were creamy white, while the others were sort of tan. The tan ones had clear wings and were flying, while the creamy ones struggled in the surface film and crawled up the stems of cattails. Ronnie tied on one of his cream colored flies to the length of fine gut.
The first carp were surfacing and slurping in the bugs as he stood to make that first delicate cast of his life.
The rotten apple hit high up on his right cheek and shattered in fragments. Ronnie’s eyes exploded in colored lights as his nostrils recoiled from the stench, and he fell backward into the shallow water. As he sat up and shook off the water and apple crud, he heard laughter. Standing to his right, not thirty feet away, was Tommy McRory, the pimpled bully of the fifth grade, standing filthy and barefoot as he always did, and grinning through his yellow teeth.
“Ronnie ponnie, puddin and pie, you got apple slime in your eye,” he sang as he approached, his matted hair almost covering his eyes.
Tommy was the eldest son of the extended McRory clan. They lived together in a run-down single story house on a slope above the swamp that bordered Stoker’s Pond. Ronnie knew that people whispered about Tommy’s pa, who delivered coal when he was not sitting behind the firehouse drinking something from a paper sack. His mother warned him to stay away from the McRorys, but she herself often left slices of cornbread or a potato or two by the coal chute. These would disappear, even if Mr. McRory avowed that he “Didn’t take no charity from no one!” to anyone who would listen.
“What you got there?” Tommy said as he grabbed the fly rod out of Ronnie’s hand.
“A fishin pole, huh? This here is my pond, sissy, so this must be my rod too.”
“Give it here Tommy, it isn’t yours and you don’t even know how to use it,” Ronnie shot back.
“Who’s gonna make me… little girl, you?” Tommy spit with foul breath. He shoved Ronnie in the shoulder and laughed in hysterics as Ronnie staggered and fell once again into the mud at the edge of the pond.
“Watch me crybaby, I’m gonna catch the biggest fish in this pond.”
The young McRory waved the rod forward as if to cast a conventional bait-caster. When it didn’t work, he threw it harder, causing a dangerous bend in the rod.
“This rod is stupid, like you, prissy-boy. It don’t work right.”
Although tears were already trickling out of his eyes, and he was unable to form words in his anger and blubbering frustration, Ronnie began to feel a sober rage forming in his belly. He wished his father were here. Dad would send the bully home with a sore behind he thought. But his father was not there, and Tommy was much bigger than he was anyway. What could he do?
Ronnie’s sneakers made a squishing sound as he rose.
“Cut it out, Tommy, you are gonna break it.”
The bully didn’t reply. He was too busy poking the rod into the water at a large carp, trying to spear it. Ronnie thought about all the money he saved for the rod, the hours spent mowing lawns and delivering papers, all the anticipation, and Mr. Theisen and the hardware store. He thought about how he would have to explain all this to his mother, and how his classmates and friends would find out; find out that in the end, Ronnie really was a scaredy-cat. A coward.
“Give it here NOW!” he shouted.
The person that uttered those words, and that now advanced on Tommy McRory was somebody Ronnie did not recognize. The words may have come from his own mouth, but they sounded older, more determined, more commanding.
Bullies are cowards at heart, and the last thing they expect is the humiliated victim to fight back, but the fist that hit McRory square in the nose was no illusion; neither was the blood that flowed down his shirt or the sudden fear and panic that sent him flying back towards the shelter of his family hovel.
Ronnie sat down and cried. Never before had he had the guts to stand up to a bully, and the raw emotion of pain and humiliation followed by triumph overwhelmed him.
When he calmed down, he looked at the rod, now broken in three pieces and lying before him. He looked for a long time in silence, then he removed the reel and line, threw the broken pieces of the rod far into the pond, and after washing the mud from his clothes and shoes as best he could given the circumstances, turned and began the long walk home, the reel safely in his jeans pocket.
For some reason, a sense of calm came over him. He reasoned that it would take some extra work, and maybe a second paper route, but next year he could buy another rod.
He had come as a boy to catch a carp. The young man that walked back on the path away from the pond felt slightly sorry for Tommy McRory. At least Ronnie had something to look forward to, he later reasoned, as he dreamed of the carp and the new rod in the deep stillness of the hot Wisconsin summer night.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
A Philosophical Look at Fly Fishing
A Philosophical Look at Fly Fishing;
Copyright 2009 Erik F. Helm
Awhile ago, while watching a spin fisherman walk far too quickly down a pretty stretch of my local smallmouth bass river, throwing casts in every direction and hauling in the occasional fish by cartwheeling it back to him, I began a slow meditation on why I flyfish. Just what is it about flyfishing that seems to captivate my soul? Why have I given up all other kinds of sport fishing? I had a lot of ideas, most overlapping and difficult to categorize. Some were more feelings than ideas. I feared it would like trying to describe fine music with mere words. In my thinking I had began to fuss and over-analyze the sport, when near dusk I made a beautiful cast, sending a pretty loop of line across the river and delivering a popper under the branches of a fallen willow, which in turn was engulfed by a beautiful and strong smallmouth bass. It was perfection. “Aha” I exclaimed aloud, “Thank you for reminding me.” Moments like this are epiphanies. Therefore, with all humility, I give you my take on flyfishing.
A good point of departure is to examine what the outside world envisions when it imagines flyfishing. If one reads any mainstream news or magazine article over the years regarding flyfishing, they all have common themes. Flyfishing seems remote and mystic, practiced by older gentlemen wise to the way of fish and river. Gentlemen who we can imagine engrossed in a good book at the hearthside and enjoying a pipe. They might be a bit misanthropic, preferring the company of a good dog and an eight-inch brookie to that of common society. The fly angler often is depicted as a bit tweedy, like a college philosophy professor with addition of rod and creel.
Flyfishing is depicted as different and elevated beyond the other forms of sport fishing. Fly anglers are depicted as serious and traditional.
The sporting Tradition:
So, letting the magazine images and portrayals guide us, let’s go back in time. Flyfishing came to America via Europe; specifically England. Flyfishing was a diversion and sport of the leisure class. Only they could afford the time and effort needed to catch a fish on horsehair lines and small feathered creations. The common workingman would never have enough time for pleasantries. Common men fished with bait and nets, while the upper classes were the practitioners of flyfishing; thus, we also see the origins of the snobbery effect. The sporting tradition in England demanded that the animal or fish supposedly be given a sporting chance. Fly anglers dressed in the finest country clothing, took pride in the aesthetics of their equipment, and fished in beautiful places for beautiful fish. Not a lot changed in the American inheritance and adoption of flyfishing. The dryfly was still considered the only way, and although the chalk streams gave way to the Catskills, the trout still lived in beautiful places, and the persons chasing them with the fly rod were still the leisure classes. Anglers still dressed in their Sunday best, and flyfishing was still considered an elevated way of sporting against the fishes. Modern flyfishers are not all members of the leisure class. We come from diverse backgrounds. We no longer wear ties and collars, and have often traded bamboo for graphite, but we are still bound together by a tradition of a fish caught in a sporting way. Given this background, let’s look at some of the inherent qualities and themes in this sporting tradition.
A quiet sport:
Above all, flyfishing is a quiet sport practiced in beautiful natural surroundings. It is a sport practiced alone, where one can hear the murmur of the brook and the wind whistling through the trees. Gone are the sounds of the city and civilization. Gone are the screaming children and barking dogs. Gone are the roaring engines and sirens; gone are the worries and stress. Fly anglers are apt to stop fishing at some point, and simply sit and watch an eagle or a sunset. Most flyfishing is done while wading, without boats. When boats are used, often they are canoes or drift boats and non-motorized or only equipped with a motor sufficient to get them out of trouble. Many fly anglers are so quiet that you would never see them if their reels didn’t click. They silently glide into the water and disappear into the mist. The rhythm of casting is slow and quiet too, as is the way the fly enters the water. Quietness is important to us as it allows us to think. Remember, music is the space between the notes.
Nature and beautiful places:
Trout live in beautiful places, as do other fish we fly anglers pursue. Nature is simplicity and a force. We try to capture essences of nature and the natural world in art and music, the smells and sounds in poetry. Nature and its language and silence are part of each of us. It is where we came from. To practice a quiet sport among such beautiful and diverse surroundings as mountain streams, big freestone rivers, and northern forest brooks is a privilege and our worship at our temple. Nature’s spiritualism is a large part of flyfishing. At the end of the day, we are as likely to lock into memory the moment the sun burned off the mists over the river at dawn, as the fish we caught. This attention to the aesthetic qualities of nature leads us to care about our treasured places, and to become concerned with the forces that threaten them. Few true fly anglers are not closet tree-huggers, if not outright members of conservation organizations. We care because we love, and we love because of beauty. We are connected to the natural world by the footprints we leave and the loops we make.
Involvement:
More than any other kind of sport fishing, fly-fishing is connected and involved with the act of fishing. Fly anglers have to make delicate casts, read water, and manage line. We strip in line by hand in order to prevent drag or give a streamer motion. We don’t just turn a crank. Because of the inherent difficulty of flyfishing, we have to think. We don’t have sonar or radar detectors to tell us exactly where the fish are, we have to explore with our feet and use our minds to defeat the fish, and bring its jeweled form to hand. To me, involvement is essential to the experience. Trolling bores me, as does watching a bobber. Having to present my fly to the fish, whether that is a dryfly, popper or swung salmon fly, involves me with life’s intricacies, struggles, and patterns. That involvement in turn combined with curiosity opens a door to the natural world, and as we study it, we don’t just become better anglers, we become more aware. In essence, we flyfishermen don’t drink beer while aimlessly chucking lures, but instead may savor a dram of single-malt after having discovered and matched a particularly mysterious hatch, or having made the perfect cast. We are involved, and appreciate the ability to make discoveries and learn. We want to be more involved in actually catching the fish. We want to say “I figured it out, made the cast, and caught the fish.” We actually want to be the main participant in the little mental and physical chase between ourselves and the fish, not let technology or someone else do it for us. This is the opposite of fishing by pulling plugs, or charter fishing with deep running dodgers and flies. The customer or fisherman here is not involved at all, merely being the last link on the chain between the fish and a whole lot of knowledge of the guide or captain. After all, the guide has rowed the boat pulling the plugs at just the right speed and in just the right place to take a fish, and the captain has the years of knowledge and sonar to locate fish. They are really fishing, not their customers. The customer merely reels in the fish for the glory shot and fish fry.
Simplicity:
Flyfishing at its essence is a simple sport; a single long rod and single hook used in pursuit of our spiritual quarry. We carry a box of flies that can fit into a pocket, not a large tackle box that weighs forty pounds. Although our rods can be complicated in taper, construction and refined use, they at essence are simply the principle of the willow branch in action; always giving and bending but never letting go, thus letting the fish tire itself out. Our flies are colors of natural furs and feathers and their imitations wrapped on an artists blank canvas of a single hook. Rarely do we need complicated rigging or weight. We need no sonar devices. Just the rod, line, and fly.
Appreciation:
I would make the argument that we who flyfish appreciate our quarry more than other sport fishers. It lies in the inherent difficulties and demands of the sport. Most of us pass through several phases of angling. First, we want to merely catch a fish. Then we want to catch the most fish. After that, we want to catch the biggest fish. Finally, we progress in our angling journey to a point where we are satisfied with just being able to fish. We come to enjoy the settings we fish in. We are happy with a small fish. We are happy with many fish. We are just happy to fish. We appreciate the privilege of fishing itself. Numbers are not important any more. We no longer have anything to prove.
In flyfishing, we have to stalk our prey. Whether a steelhead in a big roaring river, or a small bejeweled cutthroat in a mountain stream, our sport demands that we work for our quarry. That work and time spent on the river builds appreciation. I have walked off the water after catching a single memorable fish to eat blackberries or simply to soak in the moment. Some fishermen always have to catch fish. It becomes a game of numbers. When we turn a fish into a number, we have lost a piece of our soul.
Flyfishing is a difficult sport. We have to learn to cast, to wade, and to read water. The limitations of our tackle connect us to the water like no other fishing. We have to think and learn; to evolve as fishermen. We take nothing for granted. The angling experience becomes more than just fishing. When we no longer have ‘bad’ days but merely ‘introspective’ days fishing, we have truly become appreciative of the river, the fish, and the angling experience.
Aesthetics:
In addition to the beauty of the places that we pursue our fish, the tackle we use has its own aesthetic qualities. A fly is a beautiful thing. From a well-tied mayfly dry, to a full-dress Atlantic salmon pattern, our flies are tributes to the fish we catch. We spend hours at the bench tying our creations, just to send them on their way into the river like an offering, with a hope that a connection will be made to a fish. We collect books on flies, and spend winter nights organizing them in boxes. They are small pieces of art. There is little to compare in a plastic lure or metal device. Bait is just bait.
In addition to the fly, our casting is elegant; a sort of airborne ballet. A loop of flyline gently unrolling over the water to quietly place a fly on the water is something to appreciate in itself. When I practice in the park or the river, people often stop to watch for a bit. Would that happen if I were throwing a crank-bait? I doubt it. Watching a good fly-caster can be like watching a gymnast and dancer all rolled into one.
Rods can be appreciated as art as well. A cane rod can be a treasure. With its specialized taper, hand wound guides and clear varnish, it lets us see the essence of a rod in its simplest but prettiest form. Even a well-made graphite rod can be a thing of beauty. Exotic wood inserts and reel seats can match with nickel-silver hardware to create a rod worthy of being photographed.
Many of our reels can be thought of as artistic creations too. Looking at a classic American s-curve handled trout reel with black sides such as a Bogdan or Vom Hoffe one cannot be unmoved. Then there are the old Hardy reels with their own legacies and traditions. Whole books have been dedicated to the art of fly tackle and flies, perhaps more than any other fishing sport.
All fine arts and crafts like these have to be used, and in the use of beautiful tackle in beautiful places, we may achieve a sort of aesthetic beauty ourselves.
Quiet, peaceful and alone:
Flyfishing is a sport performed alone. Even if you fish with a friend, you are both doing your separate thing. There is no team: no winner, and no loser. There is no competition except with yourself and your skill. In the end the experience is yours, the memories earned, the fish won fair to hand. Flyfishing can be a meditation; a reflection. Alone we pass through time and the river, ever learning. The mistakes are ours to make alone, and the victories ours alone to celebrate. Quietly we stalk the fish, at peace with the world, and wondering what happened to the worries of yesterday.
A lifetime of learning:
One man’s life is not enough time to learn everything there is to know about flyfishing. Indeed, flyfishing can be thought of as a lifetime journey. It is a sport of reflection and thinking: an intellectual sport. As we progress as anglers, so do we progress as people, growing wise with analogies to life and fishing. If we are ever bored, we can simply change gears. We can learn to cast a two-handed rod, fish in the ocean for stripers, return to the joy of youth by fishing for bluegill, or simply put the rod away, and read a passage of Roderick Haig-Brown. There is so much to do and learn. We have become curious as flyfishers. We ask “Why?” “What if I do this?” or “What about that?” then we spend time on the water exploring our own questions.
So, let us go back to that evening on the water when all this contemplation started. The other fisherman moved through the water fast because his equipment allowed him to. He threw his tube-jig three times as far as I could cast because he could. He walked through the best water while casting to empty shallow runs because he never needed to read water. In twenty minutes, he was gone, and I would take another hour to move two hundred yards. Because I moved slowly, thinking and observing, I did fairly well. When fish started to be scarce, I changed tactics and cast to a broad flat strewn with boulders. The popper made a “bloop,” and instantly disappeared in a toilet-flush as a 17-inch smallmouth bass took the fly and proceeded to jump five times in succession. I landed it, released it and reeled up to allow a moment of contemplation and to drink in the whole scene. This was what it was all about. A blue heron flew by overhead, and the sunset-sky turned a fuchsia color. Now I knew...this is why I flyfish.
Copyright 2009 Erik F. Helm
Awhile ago, while watching a spin fisherman walk far too quickly down a pretty stretch of my local smallmouth bass river, throwing casts in every direction and hauling in the occasional fish by cartwheeling it back to him, I began a slow meditation on why I flyfish. Just what is it about flyfishing that seems to captivate my soul? Why have I given up all other kinds of sport fishing? I had a lot of ideas, most overlapping and difficult to categorize. Some were more feelings than ideas. I feared it would like trying to describe fine music with mere words. In my thinking I had began to fuss and over-analyze the sport, when near dusk I made a beautiful cast, sending a pretty loop of line across the river and delivering a popper under the branches of a fallen willow, which in turn was engulfed by a beautiful and strong smallmouth bass. It was perfection. “Aha” I exclaimed aloud, “Thank you for reminding me.” Moments like this are epiphanies. Therefore, with all humility, I give you my take on flyfishing.
A good point of departure is to examine what the outside world envisions when it imagines flyfishing. If one reads any mainstream news or magazine article over the years regarding flyfishing, they all have common themes. Flyfishing seems remote and mystic, practiced by older gentlemen wise to the way of fish and river. Gentlemen who we can imagine engrossed in a good book at the hearthside and enjoying a pipe. They might be a bit misanthropic, preferring the company of a good dog and an eight-inch brookie to that of common society. The fly angler often is depicted as a bit tweedy, like a college philosophy professor with addition of rod and creel.
Flyfishing is depicted as different and elevated beyond the other forms of sport fishing. Fly anglers are depicted as serious and traditional.
The sporting Tradition:
So, letting the magazine images and portrayals guide us, let’s go back in time. Flyfishing came to America via Europe; specifically England. Flyfishing was a diversion and sport of the leisure class. Only they could afford the time and effort needed to catch a fish on horsehair lines and small feathered creations. The common workingman would never have enough time for pleasantries. Common men fished with bait and nets, while the upper classes were the practitioners of flyfishing; thus, we also see the origins of the snobbery effect. The sporting tradition in England demanded that the animal or fish supposedly be given a sporting chance. Fly anglers dressed in the finest country clothing, took pride in the aesthetics of their equipment, and fished in beautiful places for beautiful fish. Not a lot changed in the American inheritance and adoption of flyfishing. The dryfly was still considered the only way, and although the chalk streams gave way to the Catskills, the trout still lived in beautiful places, and the persons chasing them with the fly rod were still the leisure classes. Anglers still dressed in their Sunday best, and flyfishing was still considered an elevated way of sporting against the fishes. Modern flyfishers are not all members of the leisure class. We come from diverse backgrounds. We no longer wear ties and collars, and have often traded bamboo for graphite, but we are still bound together by a tradition of a fish caught in a sporting way. Given this background, let’s look at some of the inherent qualities and themes in this sporting tradition.
A quiet sport:
Above all, flyfishing is a quiet sport practiced in beautiful natural surroundings. It is a sport practiced alone, where one can hear the murmur of the brook and the wind whistling through the trees. Gone are the sounds of the city and civilization. Gone are the screaming children and barking dogs. Gone are the roaring engines and sirens; gone are the worries and stress. Fly anglers are apt to stop fishing at some point, and simply sit and watch an eagle or a sunset. Most flyfishing is done while wading, without boats. When boats are used, often they are canoes or drift boats and non-motorized or only equipped with a motor sufficient to get them out of trouble. Many fly anglers are so quiet that you would never see them if their reels didn’t click. They silently glide into the water and disappear into the mist. The rhythm of casting is slow and quiet too, as is the way the fly enters the water. Quietness is important to us as it allows us to think. Remember, music is the space between the notes.
Nature and beautiful places:
Trout live in beautiful places, as do other fish we fly anglers pursue. Nature is simplicity and a force. We try to capture essences of nature and the natural world in art and music, the smells and sounds in poetry. Nature and its language and silence are part of each of us. It is where we came from. To practice a quiet sport among such beautiful and diverse surroundings as mountain streams, big freestone rivers, and northern forest brooks is a privilege and our worship at our temple. Nature’s spiritualism is a large part of flyfishing. At the end of the day, we are as likely to lock into memory the moment the sun burned off the mists over the river at dawn, as the fish we caught. This attention to the aesthetic qualities of nature leads us to care about our treasured places, and to become concerned with the forces that threaten them. Few true fly anglers are not closet tree-huggers, if not outright members of conservation organizations. We care because we love, and we love because of beauty. We are connected to the natural world by the footprints we leave and the loops we make.
Involvement:
More than any other kind of sport fishing, fly-fishing is connected and involved with the act of fishing. Fly anglers have to make delicate casts, read water, and manage line. We strip in line by hand in order to prevent drag or give a streamer motion. We don’t just turn a crank. Because of the inherent difficulty of flyfishing, we have to think. We don’t have sonar or radar detectors to tell us exactly where the fish are, we have to explore with our feet and use our minds to defeat the fish, and bring its jeweled form to hand. To me, involvement is essential to the experience. Trolling bores me, as does watching a bobber. Having to present my fly to the fish, whether that is a dryfly, popper or swung salmon fly, involves me with life’s intricacies, struggles, and patterns. That involvement in turn combined with curiosity opens a door to the natural world, and as we study it, we don’t just become better anglers, we become more aware. In essence, we flyfishermen don’t drink beer while aimlessly chucking lures, but instead may savor a dram of single-malt after having discovered and matched a particularly mysterious hatch, or having made the perfect cast. We are involved, and appreciate the ability to make discoveries and learn. We want to be more involved in actually catching the fish. We want to say “I figured it out, made the cast, and caught the fish.” We actually want to be the main participant in the little mental and physical chase between ourselves and the fish, not let technology or someone else do it for us. This is the opposite of fishing by pulling plugs, or charter fishing with deep running dodgers and flies. The customer or fisherman here is not involved at all, merely being the last link on the chain between the fish and a whole lot of knowledge of the guide or captain. After all, the guide has rowed the boat pulling the plugs at just the right speed and in just the right place to take a fish, and the captain has the years of knowledge and sonar to locate fish. They are really fishing, not their customers. The customer merely reels in the fish for the glory shot and fish fry.
Simplicity:
Flyfishing at its essence is a simple sport; a single long rod and single hook used in pursuit of our spiritual quarry. We carry a box of flies that can fit into a pocket, not a large tackle box that weighs forty pounds. Although our rods can be complicated in taper, construction and refined use, they at essence are simply the principle of the willow branch in action; always giving and bending but never letting go, thus letting the fish tire itself out. Our flies are colors of natural furs and feathers and their imitations wrapped on an artists blank canvas of a single hook. Rarely do we need complicated rigging or weight. We need no sonar devices. Just the rod, line, and fly.
Appreciation:
I would make the argument that we who flyfish appreciate our quarry more than other sport fishers. It lies in the inherent difficulties and demands of the sport. Most of us pass through several phases of angling. First, we want to merely catch a fish. Then we want to catch the most fish. After that, we want to catch the biggest fish. Finally, we progress in our angling journey to a point where we are satisfied with just being able to fish. We come to enjoy the settings we fish in. We are happy with a small fish. We are happy with many fish. We are just happy to fish. We appreciate the privilege of fishing itself. Numbers are not important any more. We no longer have anything to prove.
In flyfishing, we have to stalk our prey. Whether a steelhead in a big roaring river, or a small bejeweled cutthroat in a mountain stream, our sport demands that we work for our quarry. That work and time spent on the river builds appreciation. I have walked off the water after catching a single memorable fish to eat blackberries or simply to soak in the moment. Some fishermen always have to catch fish. It becomes a game of numbers. When we turn a fish into a number, we have lost a piece of our soul.
Flyfishing is a difficult sport. We have to learn to cast, to wade, and to read water. The limitations of our tackle connect us to the water like no other fishing. We have to think and learn; to evolve as fishermen. We take nothing for granted. The angling experience becomes more than just fishing. When we no longer have ‘bad’ days but merely ‘introspective’ days fishing, we have truly become appreciative of the river, the fish, and the angling experience.
Aesthetics:
In addition to the beauty of the places that we pursue our fish, the tackle we use has its own aesthetic qualities. A fly is a beautiful thing. From a well-tied mayfly dry, to a full-dress Atlantic salmon pattern, our flies are tributes to the fish we catch. We spend hours at the bench tying our creations, just to send them on their way into the river like an offering, with a hope that a connection will be made to a fish. We collect books on flies, and spend winter nights organizing them in boxes. They are small pieces of art. There is little to compare in a plastic lure or metal device. Bait is just bait.
In addition to the fly, our casting is elegant; a sort of airborne ballet. A loop of flyline gently unrolling over the water to quietly place a fly on the water is something to appreciate in itself. When I practice in the park or the river, people often stop to watch for a bit. Would that happen if I were throwing a crank-bait? I doubt it. Watching a good fly-caster can be like watching a gymnast and dancer all rolled into one.
Rods can be appreciated as art as well. A cane rod can be a treasure. With its specialized taper, hand wound guides and clear varnish, it lets us see the essence of a rod in its simplest but prettiest form. Even a well-made graphite rod can be a thing of beauty. Exotic wood inserts and reel seats can match with nickel-silver hardware to create a rod worthy of being photographed.
Many of our reels can be thought of as artistic creations too. Looking at a classic American s-curve handled trout reel with black sides such as a Bogdan or Vom Hoffe one cannot be unmoved. Then there are the old Hardy reels with their own legacies and traditions. Whole books have been dedicated to the art of fly tackle and flies, perhaps more than any other fishing sport.
All fine arts and crafts like these have to be used, and in the use of beautiful tackle in beautiful places, we may achieve a sort of aesthetic beauty ourselves.
Quiet, peaceful and alone:
Flyfishing is a sport performed alone. Even if you fish with a friend, you are both doing your separate thing. There is no team: no winner, and no loser. There is no competition except with yourself and your skill. In the end the experience is yours, the memories earned, the fish won fair to hand. Flyfishing can be a meditation; a reflection. Alone we pass through time and the river, ever learning. The mistakes are ours to make alone, and the victories ours alone to celebrate. Quietly we stalk the fish, at peace with the world, and wondering what happened to the worries of yesterday.
A lifetime of learning:
One man’s life is not enough time to learn everything there is to know about flyfishing. Indeed, flyfishing can be thought of as a lifetime journey. It is a sport of reflection and thinking: an intellectual sport. As we progress as anglers, so do we progress as people, growing wise with analogies to life and fishing. If we are ever bored, we can simply change gears. We can learn to cast a two-handed rod, fish in the ocean for stripers, return to the joy of youth by fishing for bluegill, or simply put the rod away, and read a passage of Roderick Haig-Brown. There is so much to do and learn. We have become curious as flyfishers. We ask “Why?” “What if I do this?” or “What about that?” then we spend time on the water exploring our own questions.
So, let us go back to that evening on the water when all this contemplation started. The other fisherman moved through the water fast because his equipment allowed him to. He threw his tube-jig three times as far as I could cast because he could. He walked through the best water while casting to empty shallow runs because he never needed to read water. In twenty minutes, he was gone, and I would take another hour to move two hundred yards. Because I moved slowly, thinking and observing, I did fairly well. When fish started to be scarce, I changed tactics and cast to a broad flat strewn with boulders. The popper made a “bloop,” and instantly disappeared in a toilet-flush as a 17-inch smallmouth bass took the fly and proceeded to jump five times in succession. I landed it, released it and reeled up to allow a moment of contemplation and to drink in the whole scene. This was what it was all about. A blue heron flew by overhead, and the sunset-sky turned a fuchsia color. Now I knew...this is why I flyfish.
Change, time, the town, and the river. A parable
Change, time, the town, and the river. A parable
Glenton, an affluent suburban village, began its storied history as a small rural village centered on a bend in the Waumukee River. The river flowed over limestone and gravel, and exposed bedrock and boulders created natural little rapids. People were attracted to the town, and it began to grow. At dusk, local citizens and farm laborers would often fish the river for its smallmouth bass and walleye, and take a few fish home for supper. A local carpenter built affordable wooden canoes, and sold them to the villagers for river recreation. On Sundays after church, whole families held picnics along the river while the children hunted crawfish and caught tadpoles.
Then in the 1920s, a grain company constructed a mill along the river, and a dam was built in order to form a millpond. Some citizens complained to the village, and stated that the river in its natural state was an asset to the community and the fishing and outdoor activities would suffer. Progress, jobs, and tax base however, were deemed more important.
In time the bass and walleye went away, but the people no longer noticed. They began to see the carp in the impoundment as a normal state of affairs. People fed them white bread along with the ducks and geese.
Over the years, Glenton changed. The rural town situated near a large city became a haven of affluent and successful suburbanites. Old ford pickup trucks and battered country squires were replaced by SUVs. Victorian homes were crowded by new condo developments along the river, and new restaurants and trendy shops followed the growing affluence. The citizens commuted to work in the city, but enjoyed suburban comfort and safety. More and more, they became disconnected with the natural world, and began to think of the impoundment or pond as the actual river itself. Nobody living could remember an un-dammed river in Glenton, or what it looked like. It only existed in photos in the county historical society. Children no longer haunted the river in summer, being too busy with organized sports and video games.
But, rivers and time have a way of making dust of man’s best efforts to tame nature, and the dam began to decay.
Fish passage issues and safety concerns caused the state regulatory agency to issue a removal or upgrade order, and the costs of replacing the dam were astronomical. The village decided to hold a public hearing regarding the dam and its future. People crowded the little grade-school cafeteria one fall evening to express their concerns.
The newer members of the community and owners of condos and properties abutting the river worried about their property values declining.
Others spoke of mud flats and wondered what the river would look like if the dam were removed.
They worried about lost fishing opportunities, although nobody could remember the last time anyone actually caught a fish in the impoundment. People worried aloud that “They were trying to take away our river.” Many residents expressed the view that the dam and waterfall along with the pond were aesthetically valuable to the community, and that they would have no reason to live in the town if the pond went away. A sense of communal fear of change gripped the people of Glenton.
Older town dwellers spoke about the times they went swimming in the pond back in WWII, and others mourned the possible loss of still water boating. The state regulatory agency was vilified, and people cried “Not in my back yard!”
A single elderly man addressed the board and admonished the citizens. “You are afraid of change,” he said. “You are afraid of losing something, but what will happen here if the dam is removed is that we will all trade one asset for another. A river will run through town, not a still water pond. We are ignorant of what the river will look like in the future, so we grab hold of what we have and hold on for dear life, even if what we have now is but a shadow of what we could have if the dam is removed. Think with your heads, and not your hearts.”
The village board weighed the decision before them carefully, and after heated deliberation, decided that the cost of reconstructing and maintaining the dam was prohibitive. Contractors began to drain the impoundment pond and extract the silt deposited over the years. One-day large construction equipment showed up by the river, and while the villagers watched, the dam was slowly demolished.
At first, everyone agreed that the river without the dam looked terrible, but in no time the river found its original channel and began moving the silt and creating oxygenated riffles. Aquatic insects returned, and along with them the bass and walleye. Herons and kingfishers multiplied, and bald eagles were spotted.
The gravel bars and mud flats exposed by the newly free river began to bloom with wildflowers and prairie grasses.
To everyone’s surprise, property values actually went up, as the new free-flowing river became an attraction and asset again. The ducks were still there, munching on aquatic vegetation instead of wonderbread, and looking healthier for it. People still picnicked by the river, but now they no longer had to worry about the smell of algae spoiling their sandwiches. Instead, a clean crisp water smell pervaded the park along the river. Children began to explore the waters, and crawfish were again prized.
The most vocal supporters of the dam were quiet, but in time, even they had to agree that a free-flowing river was a greater asset to the community than the warm water pond the dam had created.
The head of the local business association, himself a fervent dam supporter, was seen from time to time down by the river with an old bamboo fly-rod.
Time flowed by like the river itself, and people grew up along the newly restored river like their ancestors before them, fishing, boating and enjoying the swoops of swallows and cedar-waxwings over the river every evening. In time, the dam was long forgotten, and the village board, looking to attract tourists, changed the slogan of the community to “Glenton, where the river runs free.”
Glenton, an affluent suburban village, began its storied history as a small rural village centered on a bend in the Waumukee River. The river flowed over limestone and gravel, and exposed bedrock and boulders created natural little rapids. People were attracted to the town, and it began to grow. At dusk, local citizens and farm laborers would often fish the river for its smallmouth bass and walleye, and take a few fish home for supper. A local carpenter built affordable wooden canoes, and sold them to the villagers for river recreation. On Sundays after church, whole families held picnics along the river while the children hunted crawfish and caught tadpoles.
Then in the 1920s, a grain company constructed a mill along the river, and a dam was built in order to form a millpond. Some citizens complained to the village, and stated that the river in its natural state was an asset to the community and the fishing and outdoor activities would suffer. Progress, jobs, and tax base however, were deemed more important.
In time the bass and walleye went away, but the people no longer noticed. They began to see the carp in the impoundment as a normal state of affairs. People fed them white bread along with the ducks and geese.
Over the years, Glenton changed. The rural town situated near a large city became a haven of affluent and successful suburbanites. Old ford pickup trucks and battered country squires were replaced by SUVs. Victorian homes were crowded by new condo developments along the river, and new restaurants and trendy shops followed the growing affluence. The citizens commuted to work in the city, but enjoyed suburban comfort and safety. More and more, they became disconnected with the natural world, and began to think of the impoundment or pond as the actual river itself. Nobody living could remember an un-dammed river in Glenton, or what it looked like. It only existed in photos in the county historical society. Children no longer haunted the river in summer, being too busy with organized sports and video games.
But, rivers and time have a way of making dust of man’s best efforts to tame nature, and the dam began to decay.
Fish passage issues and safety concerns caused the state regulatory agency to issue a removal or upgrade order, and the costs of replacing the dam were astronomical. The village decided to hold a public hearing regarding the dam and its future. People crowded the little grade-school cafeteria one fall evening to express their concerns.
The newer members of the community and owners of condos and properties abutting the river worried about their property values declining.
Others spoke of mud flats and wondered what the river would look like if the dam were removed.
They worried about lost fishing opportunities, although nobody could remember the last time anyone actually caught a fish in the impoundment. People worried aloud that “They were trying to take away our river.” Many residents expressed the view that the dam and waterfall along with the pond were aesthetically valuable to the community, and that they would have no reason to live in the town if the pond went away. A sense of communal fear of change gripped the people of Glenton.
Older town dwellers spoke about the times they went swimming in the pond back in WWII, and others mourned the possible loss of still water boating. The state regulatory agency was vilified, and people cried “Not in my back yard!”
A single elderly man addressed the board and admonished the citizens. “You are afraid of change,” he said. “You are afraid of losing something, but what will happen here if the dam is removed is that we will all trade one asset for another. A river will run through town, not a still water pond. We are ignorant of what the river will look like in the future, so we grab hold of what we have and hold on for dear life, even if what we have now is but a shadow of what we could have if the dam is removed. Think with your heads, and not your hearts.”
The village board weighed the decision before them carefully, and after heated deliberation, decided that the cost of reconstructing and maintaining the dam was prohibitive. Contractors began to drain the impoundment pond and extract the silt deposited over the years. One-day large construction equipment showed up by the river, and while the villagers watched, the dam was slowly demolished.
At first, everyone agreed that the river without the dam looked terrible, but in no time the river found its original channel and began moving the silt and creating oxygenated riffles. Aquatic insects returned, and along with them the bass and walleye. Herons and kingfishers multiplied, and bald eagles were spotted.
The gravel bars and mud flats exposed by the newly free river began to bloom with wildflowers and prairie grasses.
To everyone’s surprise, property values actually went up, as the new free-flowing river became an attraction and asset again. The ducks were still there, munching on aquatic vegetation instead of wonderbread, and looking healthier for it. People still picnicked by the river, but now they no longer had to worry about the smell of algae spoiling their sandwiches. Instead, a clean crisp water smell pervaded the park along the river. Children began to explore the waters, and crawfish were again prized.
The most vocal supporters of the dam were quiet, but in time, even they had to agree that a free-flowing river was a greater asset to the community than the warm water pond the dam had created.
The head of the local business association, himself a fervent dam supporter, was seen from time to time down by the river with an old bamboo fly-rod.
Time flowed by like the river itself, and people grew up along the newly restored river like their ancestors before them, fishing, boating and enjoying the swoops of swallows and cedar-waxwings over the river every evening. In time, the dam was long forgotten, and the village board, looking to attract tourists, changed the slogan of the community to “Glenton, where the river runs free.”
Walking in Urban Nature
Walking in urban nature:
I love to take walks. Apart from the joy of exercise, walking in urban nature settings can be a journey of observation and discovery.
I was a lucky child. My father took me on long walks. On these walks to local parks, he would stop and explain to me how to identify trees by their bark, leaves, and fruit. He pointed out wildflowers. He taught me to see things that most people would never see. We watched birds and animals. He taught me to listen and how to be quiet. At night, he showed me the stars and the planets, pointed out constellations, and told me some of their stories and myths. In short, he installed in me a curiosity that grew as I did.
As a child, I was always the one peeking under things, poking into bushes, tasting berries, smelling blossoms, and looking for four leafed clovers. I had my own magnifying glass.
Fast forward many years and I am still on that same walk. A book on birds in one pocket, a curious leaf I gathered in the other. I am passed by joggers with cyber-attachments to tell them when they have achieved maximum heart rate efficiency, and wires in their ears to drown out the sounds of their own footsteps. Shaved head bikers with sunglasses roar by on motorcycles, living the consumer culture rebel dream. I walk on the grass, where nobody but the occasional dog or sunbather strays. All of humanity tends to stick to the pavement when possible.
There are others like me. Occasionally I will spot someone walking and pausing, looking into a tree, or watching a cloud. Once, a few years back, I was looking at a woodpecker through my binoculars, when a couple stopped and asked me “what I was looking for.” I answered “The meaning of life.”
I am going for a walk. Where to, I do not know.
Won’t you join me?
I love to take walks. Apart from the joy of exercise, walking in urban nature settings can be a journey of observation and discovery.
I was a lucky child. My father took me on long walks. On these walks to local parks, he would stop and explain to me how to identify trees by their bark, leaves, and fruit. He pointed out wildflowers. He taught me to see things that most people would never see. We watched birds and animals. He taught me to listen and how to be quiet. At night, he showed me the stars and the planets, pointed out constellations, and told me some of their stories and myths. In short, he installed in me a curiosity that grew as I did.
As a child, I was always the one peeking under things, poking into bushes, tasting berries, smelling blossoms, and looking for four leafed clovers. I had my own magnifying glass.
Fast forward many years and I am still on that same walk. A book on birds in one pocket, a curious leaf I gathered in the other. I am passed by joggers with cyber-attachments to tell them when they have achieved maximum heart rate efficiency, and wires in their ears to drown out the sounds of their own footsteps. Shaved head bikers with sunglasses roar by on motorcycles, living the consumer culture rebel dream. I walk on the grass, where nobody but the occasional dog or sunbather strays. All of humanity tends to stick to the pavement when possible.
There are others like me. Occasionally I will spot someone walking and pausing, looking into a tree, or watching a cloud. Once, a few years back, I was looking at a woodpecker through my binoculars, when a couple stopped and asked me “what I was looking for.” I answered “The meaning of life.”
I am going for a walk. Where to, I do not know.
Won’t you join me?
Modern Man Removed from Nature
Those of you that follow some of my writings know that I often ponder observations into philosophical daydreams. One such line of thought came to me the other evening as I cast a fly-rod in a local park on the water, and observed the interactions of people with nature.
Modern urban humans are so detached from nature’s rhythms, forms, flora, and fauna that they act like tourists from another planet.
Approaching a river, they look like deer hypnotized by headlights. They look at the water, and then begin to throw rocks and every conceivable object into the river. It is as if the river is a foe or a danger to them.
They ask me if there are fish in the river, and I reply by asking if there are any birds in the sky. Overhead, the clouds and birds slip by, unobserved. Cedar waxwings dine on insects over the river in an exuberant dance. A falcon dives on some ducklings and misses. A great blue heron spooks out of the water and croaks as it flies into a nearby willow. An owl hoots. Only I seem to notice.
Nearby, at the top of the park, elderly Russian immigrants pick mulberries and wild black raspberries. The American families amble by with cell phone and I-pod, ignorant to nature’s bounty. Food for them comes in a plastic container.
We seem to have conquered nature so completely and removed ourselves from it that it mystifies and even frightens us. Mothers cuddle their children away from the dangers of curious squirrels, girls run screaming from dragonflies, and teenagers smash anything they can reach.
A small boy spying a deer, tells his mother that it (the deer) looks kind of like the ones in his video games. His mother, busy text messaging, walks into a tree. A twelve-year-old asks his father what those funny things are in the water. (Ducks)
I wonder where the free-range humans are?
Modern urban humans are so detached from nature’s rhythms, forms, flora, and fauna that they act like tourists from another planet.
Approaching a river, they look like deer hypnotized by headlights. They look at the water, and then begin to throw rocks and every conceivable object into the river. It is as if the river is a foe or a danger to them.
They ask me if there are fish in the river, and I reply by asking if there are any birds in the sky. Overhead, the clouds and birds slip by, unobserved. Cedar waxwings dine on insects over the river in an exuberant dance. A falcon dives on some ducklings and misses. A great blue heron spooks out of the water and croaks as it flies into a nearby willow. An owl hoots. Only I seem to notice.
Nearby, at the top of the park, elderly Russian immigrants pick mulberries and wild black raspberries. The American families amble by with cell phone and I-pod, ignorant to nature’s bounty. Food for them comes in a plastic container.
We seem to have conquered nature so completely and removed ourselves from it that it mystifies and even frightens us. Mothers cuddle their children away from the dangers of curious squirrels, girls run screaming from dragonflies, and teenagers smash anything they can reach.
A small boy spying a deer, tells his mother that it (the deer) looks kind of like the ones in his video games. His mother, busy text messaging, walks into a tree. A twelve-year-old asks his father what those funny things are in the water. (Ducks)
I wonder where the free-range humans are?
The Anachronism
The Anachronism
Copyright 2009 Erik F. Helm
I discovered it again by accident while rooting around in the cellar through a pile of old fishing tackle and memories. Wrapped in its old oil cloth, the little wood rod and line had lay on a corner shelf for a good half of my lifetime. As I unwrapped it, the memories of youth came flooding back with startling vividness.
I was somewhere in my mid-twenties, the indestructible years, and was exploring a backwoods section of the Little Cherry River in central Pennsylvania. Backpacking my lunch and tackle, I had made my way through the thick dark deciduous forest lit by moving rays of sunlight cascading through the leafy canopy. I hoped to find the seclusion I needed and a few trout to round out the day. I was feeling organic as hell. I crossed the Cherry several times until I came to a series of plunge pools. The river here sang like a choral work as it tricked and poured. The trees leaned high overhead and met over the river, creating a tunnel not unlike the nave of a medieval church. An ideal place to worship nature by fooling a bespeckled trout with an artificial fly. I rigged up my little seven-foot cane rod given to me by my grandfather, tied on a fly, and started to make my way up the series of pools. By the time I had arrived at the uppermost pool I had caught and released five tiny brook trout. They were so full of color they seemed more like blossoms in the stream. Purples, reds, and blues exploded like fireworks against background rich enough to make King Midas jealous. The river above the pools was a long riffle, and as I quietly read the water, I realized I was not alone.
Along the bank of the river near the head of the riffle sat a strange figure. He was old yet lithe. His long gray hair hung down from beneath a grass hat so crude it almost seemed that it was a part of the forest itself. His shirt was either gray or dirty white, and his pants looked like faded black pajamas. He had not noticed me, but simply sat staring at the water with nary a movement. I crouched down to watch, unaware at the time exactly why I was watching, or what I expected to see.
After a few minutes, the air over the riffle suddenly came to life with the delicate flights of a few small rusty mayflies. Immediately a splashy rise showed at the surface of the water as a trout dined on nature’s morsel. This seemed to be the signal for the man to slowly move into action. He disappeared into the brush and emerged carrying a sheath knife and a newly cut thin branch of some slender tree. Sitting cross-legged on the forest floor, he used the knife to strip the bark from the branch. With the bark removed, he waved and bent the switch backwards and forwards, nodded in acceptance, and set it beside the stream.
He now went to the base of a small pine tree, and began digging with his knife until he had uncovered a small root branch of the conifer. This he cut and with subtle effort pulled all its ten feet out of the black loam. Seated again, he separated the root into multiple strands with the knife, and holding the fibers between his toes, began to braid them together. In no time at all a twenty-foot long pile of supple line lay at his feet.
The lone figure now stood up slowly and fastened the line to the tip of his slender little branch rod. I was paralyzed with fascination as he walked up to the river like he was a tree swaying, and cupped a hand in the air to capture a mayfly. Out from his pocket he took a single small hook. He set the mayfly on the top of his shoulder where it obediently stayed. Removing his hat, he plucked several strands of his long gray hair and placed them between his lips. Delicately, he tied one strand of hair to the end of his root line, while the other served to attach the little mayfly carefully to the hook.
He crouched on the bank with extreme patience and deliberate movements, slowly bringing the little wand up to hover over his head while the hook and its mayfly cargo were held in his left hand. He reminded me of a heron the way he stood still or moved with such deliberation that one was not certain if he was moving at all.
A short charged silence followed before, in the middle of the riffle, a trout made a little ring as it sipped in a mayfly. ‘Swish-shush’ went the rod, sending the line arcing beautifully over the water to place the mayfly with utmost accuracy and delicacy directly upon the spot where the ring was still expanding. Suddenly the water exploded in tiny droplets, and the slender wand began to dip and dance in the man’s ropy arms.
He smiled then; a slowly spreading smile that began at the corners of his mouth and grew to encompass first his entire face, and then spread through the whole forest. Crouched in my little perch behind a red dogwood bush, I felt his smile as if I could touch it.
I watched while in the next ten minutes he took five more brook trout, lay them reverently on the bank, fashioned a crude creel or basket from birch bark lined with fresh grass, and placed the trout in a row in the basket. Stooping to drink from the river, his lips muttered unheard words I could only take as a thankful offering. Then he did something odd. He kissed his little rod and tossed it into the riffle, turned, and walked into the forest, vanishing into the dark foliage as if he had never existed at all. The rod and line came slowly bouncing down the stream to rest at my feet.
So… this is how I came to have this switch rod wrapped in an old cloth among the chattel of the past in my cellar. I had saved it because without its physical presence I never would have trusted my memories of that day. Who or what he was I never will know, but to me he will always be a being out of place in time… a sort of essence. He was both native to the forest and yet not native to the time and day. It seems to me he slipped between time. One thing is certain though; he was the finest angler I have ever seen.
Copyright 2009 Erik F. Helm
I discovered it again by accident while rooting around in the cellar through a pile of old fishing tackle and memories. Wrapped in its old oil cloth, the little wood rod and line had lay on a corner shelf for a good half of my lifetime. As I unwrapped it, the memories of youth came flooding back with startling vividness.
I was somewhere in my mid-twenties, the indestructible years, and was exploring a backwoods section of the Little Cherry River in central Pennsylvania. Backpacking my lunch and tackle, I had made my way through the thick dark deciduous forest lit by moving rays of sunlight cascading through the leafy canopy. I hoped to find the seclusion I needed and a few trout to round out the day. I was feeling organic as hell. I crossed the Cherry several times until I came to a series of plunge pools. The river here sang like a choral work as it tricked and poured. The trees leaned high overhead and met over the river, creating a tunnel not unlike the nave of a medieval church. An ideal place to worship nature by fooling a bespeckled trout with an artificial fly. I rigged up my little seven-foot cane rod given to me by my grandfather, tied on a fly, and started to make my way up the series of pools. By the time I had arrived at the uppermost pool I had caught and released five tiny brook trout. They were so full of color they seemed more like blossoms in the stream. Purples, reds, and blues exploded like fireworks against background rich enough to make King Midas jealous. The river above the pools was a long riffle, and as I quietly read the water, I realized I was not alone.
Along the bank of the river near the head of the riffle sat a strange figure. He was old yet lithe. His long gray hair hung down from beneath a grass hat so crude it almost seemed that it was a part of the forest itself. His shirt was either gray or dirty white, and his pants looked like faded black pajamas. He had not noticed me, but simply sat staring at the water with nary a movement. I crouched down to watch, unaware at the time exactly why I was watching, or what I expected to see.
After a few minutes, the air over the riffle suddenly came to life with the delicate flights of a few small rusty mayflies. Immediately a splashy rise showed at the surface of the water as a trout dined on nature’s morsel. This seemed to be the signal for the man to slowly move into action. He disappeared into the brush and emerged carrying a sheath knife and a newly cut thin branch of some slender tree. Sitting cross-legged on the forest floor, he used the knife to strip the bark from the branch. With the bark removed, he waved and bent the switch backwards and forwards, nodded in acceptance, and set it beside the stream.
He now went to the base of a small pine tree, and began digging with his knife until he had uncovered a small root branch of the conifer. This he cut and with subtle effort pulled all its ten feet out of the black loam. Seated again, he separated the root into multiple strands with the knife, and holding the fibers between his toes, began to braid them together. In no time at all a twenty-foot long pile of supple line lay at his feet.
The lone figure now stood up slowly and fastened the line to the tip of his slender little branch rod. I was paralyzed with fascination as he walked up to the river like he was a tree swaying, and cupped a hand in the air to capture a mayfly. Out from his pocket he took a single small hook. He set the mayfly on the top of his shoulder where it obediently stayed. Removing his hat, he plucked several strands of his long gray hair and placed them between his lips. Delicately, he tied one strand of hair to the end of his root line, while the other served to attach the little mayfly carefully to the hook.
He crouched on the bank with extreme patience and deliberate movements, slowly bringing the little wand up to hover over his head while the hook and its mayfly cargo were held in his left hand. He reminded me of a heron the way he stood still or moved with such deliberation that one was not certain if he was moving at all.
A short charged silence followed before, in the middle of the riffle, a trout made a little ring as it sipped in a mayfly. ‘Swish-shush’ went the rod, sending the line arcing beautifully over the water to place the mayfly with utmost accuracy and delicacy directly upon the spot where the ring was still expanding. Suddenly the water exploded in tiny droplets, and the slender wand began to dip and dance in the man’s ropy arms.
He smiled then; a slowly spreading smile that began at the corners of his mouth and grew to encompass first his entire face, and then spread through the whole forest. Crouched in my little perch behind a red dogwood bush, I felt his smile as if I could touch it.
I watched while in the next ten minutes he took five more brook trout, lay them reverently on the bank, fashioned a crude creel or basket from birch bark lined with fresh grass, and placed the trout in a row in the basket. Stooping to drink from the river, his lips muttered unheard words I could only take as a thankful offering. Then he did something odd. He kissed his little rod and tossed it into the riffle, turned, and walked into the forest, vanishing into the dark foliage as if he had never existed at all. The rod and line came slowly bouncing down the stream to rest at my feet.
So… this is how I came to have this switch rod wrapped in an old cloth among the chattel of the past in my cellar. I had saved it because without its physical presence I never would have trusted my memories of that day. Who or what he was I never will know, but to me he will always be a being out of place in time… a sort of essence. He was both native to the forest and yet not native to the time and day. It seems to me he slipped between time. One thing is certain though; he was the finest angler I have ever seen.
Gastro-Fantastic or 'The fishing trip'
Gastro-Fantastic
I took a shortcut through the woods. The path curved through the forest floor, and I followed it with some recollection or intent to fish a Hendrickson hatch. It was a strange wood, and under the deep beds of ferns grew colorful mushrooms and flowers that reminded me of candy-canes. It all seemed so familiar, in a bizarre way. I had been here before a long, long time ago.
As the path led through a grove of unusually crabbed and ancient oaks, I spotted a cottage.
It was a small dwelling, but lit with color. Moving closer, I realized that the structure was constructed entirely of various cans of beer. “How strange,” I thought as I found myself knocking at the door.
It soon opened, and I was confronted by an old woman with a long nose complete with warts, and wearing a big floppy black hat.
“Come in my pretty,” she said. “Have a beer.”
“No thank you,” I said, as my eyes adjusted to the brightly lit interior. The old woman held out a can of Hamms, and with a grin that revealed her missing teeth, popped open the beer.
“Mmmm, good beer…, nice and cold!” she cackled.
As I refused her offering for the second time, I noticed that a large cage stood in the corner, and that an enormously rotund figure was seated in it drinking a beer. The floor of the cage was littered with empties.
“What’s going on here?” I asked, turning to the old woman.
“Oh never mind him,” she replied, “That’s just our Christmas dinner. We’re fattening him up.”
“Hey,” I exclaimed in sudden clarity, “You wouldn’t happen to be a witch?”
“Of course!” she stated, “Everyone knows me. I am the wicked witch of the forest. I live here with my husband. He cooks meth in the back shed.”
As on cue, a huge figure of a man in faded and stained bib overalls came into the room through the back door. He looked exactly like Boris Karloff playing the Frankenstein monster, but sported a NASCAR ball cap. He made a mooing noise as he walked.
“Say,” I began, “ you’ve got it all wrong. The house is supposed to be made out of candy and gingerbread, and you are supposed to be eating Hansel and Gretel after fattening them up on candy, not beer. And Lester or Zeke over there, whatever his name is, is a woodcutter, not a meth cooker.”
“Oh, we used to have a candy house many years ago,’ she reflected, “But we updated it for modern times.”
A knock sounded at the front door, and I stood aside as the witch opened it to reveal a family of bears, all bearing a striking resemblance to Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead.
“Not you again!” the witch cried. “I’ve told you before a hundred times, you have the wrong house!”
“We have no porridge here.”
This was getting stranger and stranger, and a funny sort of boiling and churning feeling was coming from the pit of my stomach.
Another knock sounded at the door, and with an exasperated sigh, the old woman opened it a second time.
The three bears were replaced by a tall figure in a red cloak and hood. He carried a fly rod and creel, and looked exactly like Izaak Walton in drag.
“What the ‘ell do you want?” the witch asked.
“I have come from the temple of Moron,” he stated loudly. “Have you heard about the end-times?”
He opened his creel to take out a religious tract, and out spilled hundreds of cans of chili. They were covered in hatching mayflies.
“Hendricksons,” I said aloud, waking to an aching in my gut.
I was in my tent, back in the real world. It was three in the morning and halfway through an epic trip for trout. As I unzipped the rain fly and made my way to the porta-john, I reflected that Rob was right in his warning to me late that evening.
Canned extra-hot chili and cheap beer is a lethal combination.
I took a shortcut through the woods. The path curved through the forest floor, and I followed it with some recollection or intent to fish a Hendrickson hatch. It was a strange wood, and under the deep beds of ferns grew colorful mushrooms and flowers that reminded me of candy-canes. It all seemed so familiar, in a bizarre way. I had been here before a long, long time ago.
As the path led through a grove of unusually crabbed and ancient oaks, I spotted a cottage.
It was a small dwelling, but lit with color. Moving closer, I realized that the structure was constructed entirely of various cans of beer. “How strange,” I thought as I found myself knocking at the door.
It soon opened, and I was confronted by an old woman with a long nose complete with warts, and wearing a big floppy black hat.
“Come in my pretty,” she said. “Have a beer.”
“No thank you,” I said, as my eyes adjusted to the brightly lit interior. The old woman held out a can of Hamms, and with a grin that revealed her missing teeth, popped open the beer.
“Mmmm, good beer…, nice and cold!” she cackled.
As I refused her offering for the second time, I noticed that a large cage stood in the corner, and that an enormously rotund figure was seated in it drinking a beer. The floor of the cage was littered with empties.
“What’s going on here?” I asked, turning to the old woman.
“Oh never mind him,” she replied, “That’s just our Christmas dinner. We’re fattening him up.”
“Hey,” I exclaimed in sudden clarity, “You wouldn’t happen to be a witch?”
“Of course!” she stated, “Everyone knows me. I am the wicked witch of the forest. I live here with my husband. He cooks meth in the back shed.”
As on cue, a huge figure of a man in faded and stained bib overalls came into the room through the back door. He looked exactly like Boris Karloff playing the Frankenstein monster, but sported a NASCAR ball cap. He made a mooing noise as he walked.
“Say,” I began, “ you’ve got it all wrong. The house is supposed to be made out of candy and gingerbread, and you are supposed to be eating Hansel and Gretel after fattening them up on candy, not beer. And Lester or Zeke over there, whatever his name is, is a woodcutter, not a meth cooker.”
“Oh, we used to have a candy house many years ago,’ she reflected, “But we updated it for modern times.”
A knock sounded at the front door, and I stood aside as the witch opened it to reveal a family of bears, all bearing a striking resemblance to Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead.
“Not you again!” the witch cried. “I’ve told you before a hundred times, you have the wrong house!”
“We have no porridge here.”
This was getting stranger and stranger, and a funny sort of boiling and churning feeling was coming from the pit of my stomach.
Another knock sounded at the door, and with an exasperated sigh, the old woman opened it a second time.
The three bears were replaced by a tall figure in a red cloak and hood. He carried a fly rod and creel, and looked exactly like Izaak Walton in drag.
“What the ‘ell do you want?” the witch asked.
“I have come from the temple of Moron,” he stated loudly. “Have you heard about the end-times?”
He opened his creel to take out a religious tract, and out spilled hundreds of cans of chili. They were covered in hatching mayflies.
“Hendricksons,” I said aloud, waking to an aching in my gut.
I was in my tent, back in the real world. It was three in the morning and halfway through an epic trip for trout. As I unzipped the rain fly and made my way to the porta-john, I reflected that Rob was right in his warning to me late that evening.
Canned extra-hot chili and cheap beer is a lethal combination.
The Strange Case of Arthur Gribbs
The Strange Case of Arthur Gribbs.
Copyright 2009 Erik F. Helm
It was in the spring of 1965 as I wandered among the tables and booths of the Charterforth flea market near my home in Connecticut that it caught my eye. At a table filled with dusty items lorded over by a similarly dusty proprietor, I noticed a long fishing rod. As I approached, I held my breath as the object began to take clearer shape. Sure enough; an antique greenheart two-handed fly rod, and in excellent condition, despite the dust. Nodding to the old man behind the table who was wearing an ancient dilapidated jacket that was more patches than coat, I placed a hand on the rod and began to examine it. “That there’s a Gypsy crappie pole” said the old man. “Catch ya a load of crappies, that pole will young lad.” I smiled at both the mistake in identifying the rod and the reference to me as a ‘young man’. Only a disheveled old coot like this would find me 50 years young. “May I lift it?” I asked while already moving it from its place leaning up against a wooden post. As the old man nodded, I took the rod in my hands in full for the first time. It was a smaller rod as they come, measuring around fourteen feet. It was colored a dark blue with some yellow decoration around the reel seat. I sighted along its length, and wonders of wonders it was straight as the proverbial arrow. Then I gave it a tentative shake. As the rod flexed back and forth and the old man rambled on about some nonsense or another, a strange subtle tingling sensation seemed to envelop the rod and travel into my hands and forearms. The sensation was subtle, but puzzled me. Was this the ‘vibration’ action I have often read of that was used by Major Grant and others in their manufacture of greenheart rods? Certainly, the seller of the ‘Gypsy crappie pole’ could be of no assistance here. I turned the rod over again and again and began a detailed examination. The tip had been repaired rather expertly, and some small dark burnt coloring marked the junction. The only other mark was a simple inscription near the butt that read “Arthur Gribbs.”
Looking around to see if my wife was near or was still adding to her thimble collection, I hesitatingly inquired of the proprietor the price of the ‘Crappie pole’. $20.00 was the reply. A heck of a lot of money for 1965, and an obvious attempt at gouging me by the old man that ran the booth, but well worth the price for a rod like this. We agreed after haggling that $15 dollars would do, and I carried the rod carefully back to the station wagon, already cringing at the expected words from my wife, “Another fishing pole? Have you gone mad?”
As it turned out, she had found and purchased a set of pink and green salt and pepper shakers shaped like eagles which were made by someone who obviously had never seen an eagle, thus she could not reprimand me as she was equally guilty. As I drove home, I started thinking of the rod and of my yearly business and fishing trip to the Don River in Scotland. This trip, which I have taken for the past three years, was my vacation from the responsibilities of the breadwinner. I got away by myself for a week, checked up on some overseas operations of my firm, and got to enjoy myself without having to tow the family around to see the world largest ball of string. The rod would be balanced by my old pre-war Hardy salmon reel, a gift from the president of our Scottish branch, and holder of fishing rights in perpetuity on the River Don.
That next weekend, as I took the family on a camping trip, I broke away for an hour to try the rod out on the lake. As I began to cast and get into the rhythm of the rod, the strange tingling sensation came back into my arms. The rod was rather heavy and cumbersome, but if I took it slow and easy and let the rod do the work, it became a delight to cast. That tingling sensation was quite strange though. Vibration indeed.
On July 23rd, I awoke in a quaint but comfortable Scottish hotel after a long but relaxing plane flight. After I visited the business and found everything in order, I called upon Allen, my partner, and the host of the fishing.
Salmon Fishing had been rather good he reported, as we drove his Landrover through the beautiful Scottish countryside and down to the Don. “Small drab flies have been the order of the day, and the ratio of grilse to adult salmon has been better than average.”
We met the other anglers that would be fishing that day, and as I assembled my tackle, I renewed my acquaintance with Calum, the ageless old ghillie. Nobody knew how old Calum was, but he seemed to be a ghillie on the river as long as anyone could remember, as his father was before him. His white hair and youthful smile, as well as his wry wit and ready net were a welcome presence.
The beat I was assigned consisted of a series of rapids slowing into a deep pool. As I got into place at the head of the run, Calum grabbed my rod and reel and began to tie on a small gray and brown feather-wing fly with what looked to be a throat hackle of blue jay. As he wound in the line, he hefted the rod, looked at it, and whistled. “That’s a devil of a wee rod you have there…I haven’t seen one like this in years. Sure is a pretty lass.” Flexing the rod, his face took on a puzzled look, and when he handed the rod back to me, I asked him what was the matter. He was looking at his left hand as he said “Years ago, when I was young and careless and after much proper malt was drunk, I did a somersault into the river on a dare and broke my hand. Since then, I have never had much feeling in it, but I swear that I just felt it tingle… Strange…”
Indeed, as I cast the rod and swung my fly, the almost electric sensation became stronger, as if the rod was singing. Half way down the run and forty minutes later, all hell broke loose as a huge chrome snout appeared beside my fly, inhaled it, and began tail walking down the river making my old Hardy reel scream for mercy. The fish was approaching the tail-out of the pool. If she ‘went over’, I would be beaten, so I eased off on the pressure to try to steer her back upstream. Back she came to hold deep in the pocket. The rapids at the end of the pool were making an awful thundering noise, but as I concentrated on the fish, the thunder seemed to be coming from somewhere above. Calum arrived beside me out of breath and obviously excited. He pointed up to the now rather ominous storm clouds growing and darkening above us. “Looks like its gonna’ rain sheep and biscuits on us soon. We better land this lass and get back to the bothie.”
I tightened up on the line and began to gain on the fish. Each slow lift was accompanied in rhythm by deep thunder from above. The rod began to get painful to hold onto. It seemed to shimmer with energy. Soon the salmon was ready for the net, and as Calum slipped it over the fish I almost imagined I could see sparks of electricity springing from the end of my rod. It began to rain steadily as Calum led me back to the bothie hut.
“Around 30 pounds I think,” Calum said with a smile as I wiped the wet out of my hair with a towel and took off my Barbour jacket. “The best fish I have seen in a grand while. Ya best be recording it in the book,” Calum said as he pointed to a large leather bound book placed in the center of the bothie table. I duly recorded my catch: the date, time, weight, sex, beat, and fly that took the fish. As Calum waited for the other anglers to show up, he slowly and deliberately began to pour out two glasses of a single malt Scotch whisky.
Fascinated by the book, I flipped back to near the beginning where the catches were recorded in flowing script that were now aged and stained. I was reading the section for 1902, and had come across an entry for a thirty-pound salmon on the same day and roughly time I had just caught mine. What a coincidence! It was when I saw the name that my mouth literally dropped open. “Arthur Gribbs, July 23rd 1902. RIP.”
“Hey” I exclaimed as Calum approached with two drams of amber nectar, “Arthur Gribbs, that’s the name on my rod, the one I got at the flea market…the one I just used to land my biggest salmon ever!”
Calum’s facial expression changed instantly, and he took on a dark and cautious look. He set down the whisky on the table and took up the butt of the rod, read the inscription, stood upright, turned, and stared me in the eyes for what seemed like eternity. It was if he were examining my soul.
“It’s a long story from long ago when I was a wee lad,” he said as he returned with the bottle and topped up the glasses generously. “To the river, and the spirits of the unknown,” he proclaimed as we sipped. The whisky was the finest I have ever tasted with the hint of peat and caramel blended with a whisper of heather, honey, and as I imagined it, the spray of salt and the wee hint of fish.
Rain thundered against the roof and sides of the hut. As Calum drained his glass and refilled it, his face was lit from the side by the flickering of lightning.
“I was an apprentice ghillie that summer; my first year helping my father. I was green as a newborn but eager as ‘ell” he chuckled. “I was in charge of carrying the fish and the gentleman’s rods…not allowed yet to touch anything else. One evening we were fishing the very run you took your fish in. It used to be called the ‘auld medden’ pool back then, but ever since has been known as the ‘dead pool.’”
“Mr. Gribbs was a ‘ell of a fisherman. He never tired of casting and was fun to be around. He actually made my job enjoyable. He was from England, but lived in the states. After two days with only catching a single grilse, he hooked a beauty in the heart of the run. The fish was one of the leapingist salmon I ever saw. It was so strong that he could not seem to gain any line, and the fish had done a better job with him than he got of the fish. After along about an hour it began to rain, but old Arthur, he just laughed as the water poured off his hat and into his eyes. He wanted this salmon. Well, as I said, Mr. Gribbs was a fine fisherman, and he fought the fish well. After some give and take, he got the salmon to within a few feet of the river’s edge and went to tail her. He would not let us gaff her, nor net her. He wanted to do it alone. He did it too. In that wind and rain and thunder he tailed the fish, staggered ashore, and held it out in front of him while giving a primal roar of delight.”
Calum took a long draught of the single malt and paused. “It was the last thing old Arthur Gribbs ever did, holding that salmon in triumph before him with that huge smile of his. The next second, with a crack and a blinding flash, a bolt of lightning struck the tip of his upturned rod, and he was felled dead.”
I felt as if I was listening in slow motion as he went over to the book. “That is my father’s writing. Arthur could not have recorded his salmon on account of his lying dead on the grass. RIP… Rest In Peace. Your salmon is the spitting image of his, all these years later.”
I took the rod in my hand, looking all the time at the repaired tip with its little burn mark.
“Here, Calum” I said, handing him the rod. “It remembered. The damn rod remembered all the time with its electric tingling. It is home now. Let it stay here where it belongs.”
Calum smiled.
We raised a parting glass to the strange story of Mr. Arthur Gribbs.
Copyright 2009 Erik F. Helm
It was in the spring of 1965 as I wandered among the tables and booths of the Charterforth flea market near my home in Connecticut that it caught my eye. At a table filled with dusty items lorded over by a similarly dusty proprietor, I noticed a long fishing rod. As I approached, I held my breath as the object began to take clearer shape. Sure enough; an antique greenheart two-handed fly rod, and in excellent condition, despite the dust. Nodding to the old man behind the table who was wearing an ancient dilapidated jacket that was more patches than coat, I placed a hand on the rod and began to examine it. “That there’s a Gypsy crappie pole” said the old man. “Catch ya a load of crappies, that pole will young lad.” I smiled at both the mistake in identifying the rod and the reference to me as a ‘young man’. Only a disheveled old coot like this would find me 50 years young. “May I lift it?” I asked while already moving it from its place leaning up against a wooden post. As the old man nodded, I took the rod in my hands in full for the first time. It was a smaller rod as they come, measuring around fourteen feet. It was colored a dark blue with some yellow decoration around the reel seat. I sighted along its length, and wonders of wonders it was straight as the proverbial arrow. Then I gave it a tentative shake. As the rod flexed back and forth and the old man rambled on about some nonsense or another, a strange subtle tingling sensation seemed to envelop the rod and travel into my hands and forearms. The sensation was subtle, but puzzled me. Was this the ‘vibration’ action I have often read of that was used by Major Grant and others in their manufacture of greenheart rods? Certainly, the seller of the ‘Gypsy crappie pole’ could be of no assistance here. I turned the rod over again and again and began a detailed examination. The tip had been repaired rather expertly, and some small dark burnt coloring marked the junction. The only other mark was a simple inscription near the butt that read “Arthur Gribbs.”
Looking around to see if my wife was near or was still adding to her thimble collection, I hesitatingly inquired of the proprietor the price of the ‘Crappie pole’. $20.00 was the reply. A heck of a lot of money for 1965, and an obvious attempt at gouging me by the old man that ran the booth, but well worth the price for a rod like this. We agreed after haggling that $15 dollars would do, and I carried the rod carefully back to the station wagon, already cringing at the expected words from my wife, “Another fishing pole? Have you gone mad?”
As it turned out, she had found and purchased a set of pink and green salt and pepper shakers shaped like eagles which were made by someone who obviously had never seen an eagle, thus she could not reprimand me as she was equally guilty. As I drove home, I started thinking of the rod and of my yearly business and fishing trip to the Don River in Scotland. This trip, which I have taken for the past three years, was my vacation from the responsibilities of the breadwinner. I got away by myself for a week, checked up on some overseas operations of my firm, and got to enjoy myself without having to tow the family around to see the world largest ball of string. The rod would be balanced by my old pre-war Hardy salmon reel, a gift from the president of our Scottish branch, and holder of fishing rights in perpetuity on the River Don.
That next weekend, as I took the family on a camping trip, I broke away for an hour to try the rod out on the lake. As I began to cast and get into the rhythm of the rod, the strange tingling sensation came back into my arms. The rod was rather heavy and cumbersome, but if I took it slow and easy and let the rod do the work, it became a delight to cast. That tingling sensation was quite strange though. Vibration indeed.
On July 23rd, I awoke in a quaint but comfortable Scottish hotel after a long but relaxing plane flight. After I visited the business and found everything in order, I called upon Allen, my partner, and the host of the fishing.
Salmon Fishing had been rather good he reported, as we drove his Landrover through the beautiful Scottish countryside and down to the Don. “Small drab flies have been the order of the day, and the ratio of grilse to adult salmon has been better than average.”
We met the other anglers that would be fishing that day, and as I assembled my tackle, I renewed my acquaintance with Calum, the ageless old ghillie. Nobody knew how old Calum was, but he seemed to be a ghillie on the river as long as anyone could remember, as his father was before him. His white hair and youthful smile, as well as his wry wit and ready net were a welcome presence.
The beat I was assigned consisted of a series of rapids slowing into a deep pool. As I got into place at the head of the run, Calum grabbed my rod and reel and began to tie on a small gray and brown feather-wing fly with what looked to be a throat hackle of blue jay. As he wound in the line, he hefted the rod, looked at it, and whistled. “That’s a devil of a wee rod you have there…I haven’t seen one like this in years. Sure is a pretty lass.” Flexing the rod, his face took on a puzzled look, and when he handed the rod back to me, I asked him what was the matter. He was looking at his left hand as he said “Years ago, when I was young and careless and after much proper malt was drunk, I did a somersault into the river on a dare and broke my hand. Since then, I have never had much feeling in it, but I swear that I just felt it tingle… Strange…”
Indeed, as I cast the rod and swung my fly, the almost electric sensation became stronger, as if the rod was singing. Half way down the run and forty minutes later, all hell broke loose as a huge chrome snout appeared beside my fly, inhaled it, and began tail walking down the river making my old Hardy reel scream for mercy. The fish was approaching the tail-out of the pool. If she ‘went over’, I would be beaten, so I eased off on the pressure to try to steer her back upstream. Back she came to hold deep in the pocket. The rapids at the end of the pool were making an awful thundering noise, but as I concentrated on the fish, the thunder seemed to be coming from somewhere above. Calum arrived beside me out of breath and obviously excited. He pointed up to the now rather ominous storm clouds growing and darkening above us. “Looks like its gonna’ rain sheep and biscuits on us soon. We better land this lass and get back to the bothie.”
I tightened up on the line and began to gain on the fish. Each slow lift was accompanied in rhythm by deep thunder from above. The rod began to get painful to hold onto. It seemed to shimmer with energy. Soon the salmon was ready for the net, and as Calum slipped it over the fish I almost imagined I could see sparks of electricity springing from the end of my rod. It began to rain steadily as Calum led me back to the bothie hut.
“Around 30 pounds I think,” Calum said with a smile as I wiped the wet out of my hair with a towel and took off my Barbour jacket. “The best fish I have seen in a grand while. Ya best be recording it in the book,” Calum said as he pointed to a large leather bound book placed in the center of the bothie table. I duly recorded my catch: the date, time, weight, sex, beat, and fly that took the fish. As Calum waited for the other anglers to show up, he slowly and deliberately began to pour out two glasses of a single malt Scotch whisky.
Fascinated by the book, I flipped back to near the beginning where the catches were recorded in flowing script that were now aged and stained. I was reading the section for 1902, and had come across an entry for a thirty-pound salmon on the same day and roughly time I had just caught mine. What a coincidence! It was when I saw the name that my mouth literally dropped open. “Arthur Gribbs, July 23rd 1902. RIP.”
“Hey” I exclaimed as Calum approached with two drams of amber nectar, “Arthur Gribbs, that’s the name on my rod, the one I got at the flea market…the one I just used to land my biggest salmon ever!”
Calum’s facial expression changed instantly, and he took on a dark and cautious look. He set down the whisky on the table and took up the butt of the rod, read the inscription, stood upright, turned, and stared me in the eyes for what seemed like eternity. It was if he were examining my soul.
“It’s a long story from long ago when I was a wee lad,” he said as he returned with the bottle and topped up the glasses generously. “To the river, and the spirits of the unknown,” he proclaimed as we sipped. The whisky was the finest I have ever tasted with the hint of peat and caramel blended with a whisper of heather, honey, and as I imagined it, the spray of salt and the wee hint of fish.
Rain thundered against the roof and sides of the hut. As Calum drained his glass and refilled it, his face was lit from the side by the flickering of lightning.
“I was an apprentice ghillie that summer; my first year helping my father. I was green as a newborn but eager as ‘ell” he chuckled. “I was in charge of carrying the fish and the gentleman’s rods…not allowed yet to touch anything else. One evening we were fishing the very run you took your fish in. It used to be called the ‘auld medden’ pool back then, but ever since has been known as the ‘dead pool.’”
“Mr. Gribbs was a ‘ell of a fisherman. He never tired of casting and was fun to be around. He actually made my job enjoyable. He was from England, but lived in the states. After two days with only catching a single grilse, he hooked a beauty in the heart of the run. The fish was one of the leapingist salmon I ever saw. It was so strong that he could not seem to gain any line, and the fish had done a better job with him than he got of the fish. After along about an hour it began to rain, but old Arthur, he just laughed as the water poured off his hat and into his eyes. He wanted this salmon. Well, as I said, Mr. Gribbs was a fine fisherman, and he fought the fish well. After some give and take, he got the salmon to within a few feet of the river’s edge and went to tail her. He would not let us gaff her, nor net her. He wanted to do it alone. He did it too. In that wind and rain and thunder he tailed the fish, staggered ashore, and held it out in front of him while giving a primal roar of delight.”
Calum took a long draught of the single malt and paused. “It was the last thing old Arthur Gribbs ever did, holding that salmon in triumph before him with that huge smile of his. The next second, with a crack and a blinding flash, a bolt of lightning struck the tip of his upturned rod, and he was felled dead.”
I felt as if I was listening in slow motion as he went over to the book. “That is my father’s writing. Arthur could not have recorded his salmon on account of his lying dead on the grass. RIP… Rest In Peace. Your salmon is the spitting image of his, all these years later.”
I took the rod in my hand, looking all the time at the repaired tip with its little burn mark.
“Here, Calum” I said, handing him the rod. “It remembered. The damn rod remembered all the time with its electric tingling. It is home now. Let it stay here where it belongs.”
Calum smiled.
We raised a parting glass to the strange story of Mr. Arthur Gribbs.
The Cadenza
The Cadenza
I just had to get out. There is a point in our winters in the Minnesota north woods when serious dementia can take hold, despite our best efforts. Call it cabin fever, seasonal affective disorder, or winter blues; it is what drives Alaskans and others in desolate climates barking mad each and every year.
I was suffering from writers block, or more appropriately, composer’s block. Having completed a commission for a short piano concerto, all that was left was to write the cadenza. How one runs a metaphorical marathon of inspiration, only to come up short, unable to continue and within sight of the finish line, is beyond me to explain, but here I was.
I sat for days at the piano scribbling notes and crossing them out. I listened to recordings. I cooked, cleaned, wrote poetry, reorganized the sock drawer; all to no avail. If something didn’t happen soon, I was going to run up against the deadline, and the regional symphony would have no holiday showpiece. As I stared out the frosted window while sipping hot cocoa I knew I needed a change of pace.
I expect everyone has a special little place they go to get back in touch with the voice of their soul. For me, that place was a creek that ran though the woods not a mile from my cabin.
It was December 15th, so I had little expectations other than the possibility of a bit of open water in the riffles. I grabbed my knocking-around rod, an old South Bend cane with a bit of an actual southerly bend, donned my parka and snowshoes, and with a single box of tattered flies, set out for the stream. If nothing else, the fresh air and exercise would help to clear the cobwebs from my head.
The world was painted with a deep and soft background of white intersected by brown, black, and gray vertical lines. Dark and moody clouds loomed overhead. I took the path through the woods, and noticed that a hare and a skunk had preceded me. Chickadees and cardinals imparted motion to the sleepy landscape as I trudged forward. I still had no real idea what I was going to fish for on the frozen creek, escape, trout, inspiration, or perhaps just solace.
Arriving by the little riffle, I was delighted to find a twenty-foot pool of open water. I cleared the snow from my snowshoes, and began rigging the rod when the clouds parted and the sun shown forth in all its glory. Tying on a dark nymph with a slightly rusted hook, I crept slowly to the edge of the pool and peered in, letting my eyes become accustomed to the sun and the water.
Then I saw it. There was a flash of silver in the very center of the pool. There was a brook trout down there, moving from side to side and examining his upside-down world.
I tossed the fly to the top of the pool and slowed its travel to sink it. The fish immediately flashed on the nymph. At the very moment I struck and missed, strange sounds started to issue from the bushes and branches surrounding the stream. They began slowly, almost tentatively, and then grew steadily. I was at a complete loss. What was this?
Then it dawned on me. The forest was alive with the sounds of melting snow and the formation of icicles. It made sense now. The temperature according to my window thermometer at the cabin was 12 degrees Fahrenheit. The sun was heating the branches and melting the snow, which in turn, froze into icicles. Then the icicles began to crack. Snow fell from the uppermost branches of trees, and unloosed the ice, which tinkled onto the frozen surface of the stream. The limbs above began to groan in low notes.
“Groan, tick, tick, tinkle, swoosh, tinkle, ping, crack said the woods in ¾ time.
Suddenly I had it. Here it was: nature’s own music and rhythm. The perfection of snow and ice and winter sun playing on their own instruments a delicate ode to the end of the year. I quickly found the stub of a pencil and began recording on the back of my fishing notebook the chords and melodies that were playing before me. The little fish could wait.
I had found my cadenza.
I just had to get out. There is a point in our winters in the Minnesota north woods when serious dementia can take hold, despite our best efforts. Call it cabin fever, seasonal affective disorder, or winter blues; it is what drives Alaskans and others in desolate climates barking mad each and every year.
I was suffering from writers block, or more appropriately, composer’s block. Having completed a commission for a short piano concerto, all that was left was to write the cadenza. How one runs a metaphorical marathon of inspiration, only to come up short, unable to continue and within sight of the finish line, is beyond me to explain, but here I was.
I sat for days at the piano scribbling notes and crossing them out. I listened to recordings. I cooked, cleaned, wrote poetry, reorganized the sock drawer; all to no avail. If something didn’t happen soon, I was going to run up against the deadline, and the regional symphony would have no holiday showpiece. As I stared out the frosted window while sipping hot cocoa I knew I needed a change of pace.
I expect everyone has a special little place they go to get back in touch with the voice of their soul. For me, that place was a creek that ran though the woods not a mile from my cabin.
It was December 15th, so I had little expectations other than the possibility of a bit of open water in the riffles. I grabbed my knocking-around rod, an old South Bend cane with a bit of an actual southerly bend, donned my parka and snowshoes, and with a single box of tattered flies, set out for the stream. If nothing else, the fresh air and exercise would help to clear the cobwebs from my head.
The world was painted with a deep and soft background of white intersected by brown, black, and gray vertical lines. Dark and moody clouds loomed overhead. I took the path through the woods, and noticed that a hare and a skunk had preceded me. Chickadees and cardinals imparted motion to the sleepy landscape as I trudged forward. I still had no real idea what I was going to fish for on the frozen creek, escape, trout, inspiration, or perhaps just solace.
Arriving by the little riffle, I was delighted to find a twenty-foot pool of open water. I cleared the snow from my snowshoes, and began rigging the rod when the clouds parted and the sun shown forth in all its glory. Tying on a dark nymph with a slightly rusted hook, I crept slowly to the edge of the pool and peered in, letting my eyes become accustomed to the sun and the water.
Then I saw it. There was a flash of silver in the very center of the pool. There was a brook trout down there, moving from side to side and examining his upside-down world.
I tossed the fly to the top of the pool and slowed its travel to sink it. The fish immediately flashed on the nymph. At the very moment I struck and missed, strange sounds started to issue from the bushes and branches surrounding the stream. They began slowly, almost tentatively, and then grew steadily. I was at a complete loss. What was this?
Then it dawned on me. The forest was alive with the sounds of melting snow and the formation of icicles. It made sense now. The temperature according to my window thermometer at the cabin was 12 degrees Fahrenheit. The sun was heating the branches and melting the snow, which in turn, froze into icicles. Then the icicles began to crack. Snow fell from the uppermost branches of trees, and unloosed the ice, which tinkled onto the frozen surface of the stream. The limbs above began to groan in low notes.
“Groan, tick, tick, tinkle, swoosh, tinkle, ping, crack said the woods in ¾ time.
Suddenly I had it. Here it was: nature’s own music and rhythm. The perfection of snow and ice and winter sun playing on their own instruments a delicate ode to the end of the year. I quickly found the stub of a pencil and began recording on the back of my fishing notebook the chords and melodies that were playing before me. The little fish could wait.
I had found my cadenza.
The Footprint
The Footprint
The Tomorrow River had been fickle that morning as I picked my way up the boulder strewn pocket water casting a dry fly and enjoying some of the most spectacular cloud formations the Wisconsin sky could conjure up. The brown trout were there somewhere, even if I could only intercept or tempt them sporadically. I was hoping for a definable hatch of mayflies or caddis, but the mixed batch of varied insects made for a challenging outing. I had managed a few small fish, and spooked an old boy around seventeen inches from beneath a root cluster.
Coming to the belated conclusion that flailing the water with a dry fly with no fish rising was an exercise in futility, I sat down on a large granite boulder at stream-side and unbuckled my canvas tackle bag. Unwrapping my bacon sandwich, I began to eat my lunch. Accompanying lunch was a paperback of Robert Frost’s poetry. The perfect compliment to the wild countryside and a fitting distraction from the uncooperative trout. I found “Hyla Brook’ most enjoyable. This, I realized once again, was why I fly fished. Something about the flowing water, drifting clouds, and the infinite green colors of the foliage erased things from my mind which had crept in like silent mosquitoes to suck and dine upon my thoughts. Here I could be truly free. Had I been an artist, I could have tried to capture that moment in time, but a river never sleeps, and to try to paint a little snapshot in time could never capture the way that everything felt alive with movement.
After an hour or so of daydreaming and contemplative dozing on my stream-side rock, I felt it was time to begin my foray for trout again. The next bend of the river offered new possibilities as it was shaded by numerous cedars. I had picked my way to the top of the little bend, missing one fish and landing another six-inch brown the color of country butter and honey, when I saw him. He was at the top of the next pool casting into a shallow riffle. Crouched down by the water’s edge, his straw porkpie hat angled slightly on his head, he wore an old red and black check lumberjack shirt as he puffed a pipe and peered into the water. As I watched, he quickly fired a cast into the riffle, hooked, played, and released a nicely sized brown. A minute later he repeated the performance. This guy obviously knew what he was doing. As I was getting up to continue forward, he landed a third fish, this one larger than the other two put together. Watching him fish and wading upstream at the same time led to my stumbling on an unseen rock. Regaining my balance by staggering for footholds on the gravel and sand bottom, I was less then quiet. The water splashed about my boots and cascaded onto my face. Looking upriver through the droplets of water on my glasses, I noticed to my surprise that the man was gone. He had disappeared without a trace. If he had waded the river, or burst through the tight brush, I did not know, but he was gone sure enough.
The trout however, were still rising in the riffle he had been fishing. A bug buzzed clumsily into my face, and as I grabbed it with an open hand, it was revealed to be a large spotted sedge or caddis. Fumbling around in my wallet for the appropriate fly, I found a fairly close imitation tied with a bucktail wing. Trout rose carelessly in the riffle often splashing water onto the bank in their enthusiasm. The first cast I made received a surface roll by a fish, but no take. The next cast received no interest at all, as did the following two dozen drifts of the fly. I began to change flies every other cast, and had worked through my entire arsenal of caddis imitations both dry and wet without a single positive result.
There is a time and a place for everything, and as frustration set in, I decided that I needed a mental break. I did not want to wade through the riffle and spook the fish, so I made my way to the bank and slipped through the cedars and ferns. The soil was black and rich, and sucked at my boots as I struggled along making my way up the river. Not twenty feet from where I came out of the river I spotted a footprint pointing into the woods. Wanting to follow what must have been the path taken by the other angler, I looked for more footprints. I consider myself a decent tracker, having spent the better part of twenty years as a bow-hunter, but try as I may, I could not locate his path. It was as if after making that single imprint, he vanished completely. Coming back to the footprint, I noticed a large caddis like the ones hatching that moment in the river. It was perched at the end of a blade of grass arcing over the footprint. When I grabbed at it, a funny thing happened: it never tried to fly off, and didn’t even flutter. Then I noticed the hook protruding from the bottom. This was an artificial fly. A fly tied so convincingly that it had fooled me. It had a slender cream body, antennas made from what looked like moose hair, and a tent wing which appeared after some examination to be a triangle of pounded deer skin which was waxed. Why it was here, perched above this single footprint, I could only speculate.
What I was certain of was that this fly was the one that fooled those trout in the nearby riffle. To prove my hypothesis, I tied it to my line and went back to the riffle. On the first cast I rose, hooked, and landed a fourteen-inch brown. The second cast produced a foot long fish, as did the third and fourth casts. In wonder, I hooked the fly to the keeper on the rod, and began to make my way upstream when a cautionary thought occurred to me. What if this fly was too perfect? What if that lone fisherman had placed it there for a reason? I imagined a scenario in which every cast I made with this fly would catch a fish, and realized that all the mystery and challenge would vanish forever. It could have been simply dropped by the other angler, offered up as a courtesy, or placed as a curse. I did not intend to find out. I made my way back to the footprint, hooked the fly into the blade of grass where I found it, and tearing off a sheet of paper from my little fishing log notebook, wrote the words “Thank you!” and placed it next to the footprint. The way I came to see it as I made my way back to the truck was that what happens on the water stays on the water. Whether skill, magic, or curse, that fly belonged along side that riffle, and I belonged at home where a lonely dog and warm fireplace awaited me.
The Tomorrow River had been fickle that morning as I picked my way up the boulder strewn pocket water casting a dry fly and enjoying some of the most spectacular cloud formations the Wisconsin sky could conjure up. The brown trout were there somewhere, even if I could only intercept or tempt them sporadically. I was hoping for a definable hatch of mayflies or caddis, but the mixed batch of varied insects made for a challenging outing. I had managed a few small fish, and spooked an old boy around seventeen inches from beneath a root cluster.
Coming to the belated conclusion that flailing the water with a dry fly with no fish rising was an exercise in futility, I sat down on a large granite boulder at stream-side and unbuckled my canvas tackle bag. Unwrapping my bacon sandwich, I began to eat my lunch. Accompanying lunch was a paperback of Robert Frost’s poetry. The perfect compliment to the wild countryside and a fitting distraction from the uncooperative trout. I found “Hyla Brook’ most enjoyable. This, I realized once again, was why I fly fished. Something about the flowing water, drifting clouds, and the infinite green colors of the foliage erased things from my mind which had crept in like silent mosquitoes to suck and dine upon my thoughts. Here I could be truly free. Had I been an artist, I could have tried to capture that moment in time, but a river never sleeps, and to try to paint a little snapshot in time could never capture the way that everything felt alive with movement.
After an hour or so of daydreaming and contemplative dozing on my stream-side rock, I felt it was time to begin my foray for trout again. The next bend of the river offered new possibilities as it was shaded by numerous cedars. I had picked my way to the top of the little bend, missing one fish and landing another six-inch brown the color of country butter and honey, when I saw him. He was at the top of the next pool casting into a shallow riffle. Crouched down by the water’s edge, his straw porkpie hat angled slightly on his head, he wore an old red and black check lumberjack shirt as he puffed a pipe and peered into the water. As I watched, he quickly fired a cast into the riffle, hooked, played, and released a nicely sized brown. A minute later he repeated the performance. This guy obviously knew what he was doing. As I was getting up to continue forward, he landed a third fish, this one larger than the other two put together. Watching him fish and wading upstream at the same time led to my stumbling on an unseen rock. Regaining my balance by staggering for footholds on the gravel and sand bottom, I was less then quiet. The water splashed about my boots and cascaded onto my face. Looking upriver through the droplets of water on my glasses, I noticed to my surprise that the man was gone. He had disappeared without a trace. If he had waded the river, or burst through the tight brush, I did not know, but he was gone sure enough.
The trout however, were still rising in the riffle he had been fishing. A bug buzzed clumsily into my face, and as I grabbed it with an open hand, it was revealed to be a large spotted sedge or caddis. Fumbling around in my wallet for the appropriate fly, I found a fairly close imitation tied with a bucktail wing. Trout rose carelessly in the riffle often splashing water onto the bank in their enthusiasm. The first cast I made received a surface roll by a fish, but no take. The next cast received no interest at all, as did the following two dozen drifts of the fly. I began to change flies every other cast, and had worked through my entire arsenal of caddis imitations both dry and wet without a single positive result.
There is a time and a place for everything, and as frustration set in, I decided that I needed a mental break. I did not want to wade through the riffle and spook the fish, so I made my way to the bank and slipped through the cedars and ferns. The soil was black and rich, and sucked at my boots as I struggled along making my way up the river. Not twenty feet from where I came out of the river I spotted a footprint pointing into the woods. Wanting to follow what must have been the path taken by the other angler, I looked for more footprints. I consider myself a decent tracker, having spent the better part of twenty years as a bow-hunter, but try as I may, I could not locate his path. It was as if after making that single imprint, he vanished completely. Coming back to the footprint, I noticed a large caddis like the ones hatching that moment in the river. It was perched at the end of a blade of grass arcing over the footprint. When I grabbed at it, a funny thing happened: it never tried to fly off, and didn’t even flutter. Then I noticed the hook protruding from the bottom. This was an artificial fly. A fly tied so convincingly that it had fooled me. It had a slender cream body, antennas made from what looked like moose hair, and a tent wing which appeared after some examination to be a triangle of pounded deer skin which was waxed. Why it was here, perched above this single footprint, I could only speculate.
What I was certain of was that this fly was the one that fooled those trout in the nearby riffle. To prove my hypothesis, I tied it to my line and went back to the riffle. On the first cast I rose, hooked, and landed a fourteen-inch brown. The second cast produced a foot long fish, as did the third and fourth casts. In wonder, I hooked the fly to the keeper on the rod, and began to make my way upstream when a cautionary thought occurred to me. What if this fly was too perfect? What if that lone fisherman had placed it there for a reason? I imagined a scenario in which every cast I made with this fly would catch a fish, and realized that all the mystery and challenge would vanish forever. It could have been simply dropped by the other angler, offered up as a courtesy, or placed as a curse. I did not intend to find out. I made my way back to the footprint, hooked the fly into the blade of grass where I found it, and tearing off a sheet of paper from my little fishing log notebook, wrote the words “Thank you!” and placed it next to the footprint. The way I came to see it as I made my way back to the truck was that what happens on the water stays on the water. Whether skill, magic, or curse, that fly belonged along side that riffle, and I belonged at home where a lonely dog and warm fireplace awaited me.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
Dark Hamish
Copyright 2008
By Erik Helm
It was in the late summer of 1957 that my fiancee Ann and I traveled to Scotland as a sort of pre-marriage honeymoon. Ann was interested in the unique Scottish scenery and as an artist, was looking forward to painting and sketching landscapes. I was going to see the land of my distant ancestors, and to fish for salmon on the Deveron River. The whole trip was to be inexpensive, as we had booked the steamship tickets second class, and received the fishing rights from a wealthy friend of my father’s as an early wedding present. Salmon fishing in Scotland is a sport of the wealthy, and in order to keep it that way clubs and associations control both river access and fishing. One can’t just go down to the river and fish, but instead must buy memberships or purchase time on the water. I would never have afforded it on my own without being given the fishing as a gift.
I had prepared for the trip by tying dozens of traditional salmon flies. An avid fly tier, I owned the books by Kelson and Pryce-Tannatt, and was captivated by the colors and curves of their salmon flies.
Arriving anxiously after the long sea voyage, Ann and I checked in to our lodgings near the town of Huntly; a public house called the “Black Bottle.” A charming stone and wood two-story building dating from Tudor times, it consisted of a darkly lit but comfortable pub and separate small dining area on the first floor, and three bedrooms on the second.
The first thing we noticed when we entered the pub was the warmth of the fire, which both provided much of the illumination, and beckoned the chilled traveler to sit awhile and enjoy a pint of ale. It may still have been late summer, but the unpredictable damp Scottish weather could turn downright chilly. The barroom had long tables and benches that were heavy and made of oak. They were darkened with the smoke of the fire, spilled porter, and the sweat of the travelers and locals who found solace hunched over their pints.
The walls were of beam and stucco and seemed as old as the hills. The décor was sparse, consisting of mostly old faded pictures of local scenery, portraits of famous Scotsmen cut from books, and a few tantalizing photos of anglers dressed in tweeds and holding their proud catches. Several rusted pieces of armor dating from the period of the English Civil War hung behind the bar itself. One I recognized as an excellent example of a lobster-pot helmet.
The rear of the bar consisted of small casks of spirits, and various bottles. Centered over the bar was the namesake for the pub, a leather flask or bottle of prodigious size dating from the late medieval period.
On the whole I found the pub itself to be rustic and charming. As a graduate student in history, I preferred local color to any mass appeal hotel anyway, and the description given by my father’s friend in his recommendation of the Inn did it justice. Ann turned to me smiling, and indicated her approval.
The innkeeper and pub owner, a ruddy faced and portly man with a thick red beard, who introduced himself only as ‘Bob’, showed us up the creaking staircase to our room. He explained that the hostess ‘Mary’ was in town at market and would be back shortly to see to our needs.
In contrast to the dim and dark pub, the second floor was clean and well lit. Our room was small, (Ann, always the optimist, called it cozy), and featured a wood framed feather bed and a view encompassing the immediate countryside, and on the horizon, the Deveron. Ann was thrilled with the scenery, and couldn’t wait to set up her little portable easel and watercolors. It may have been only 4 p.m., but we were very tired from the long bumpy bus-ride to the Inn, and instead of sallying forth, we just collapsed into the featherbed.
The next morning’s sun had barely began to burn off the moist fog when we were awakened by Mary bearing a large bowl of hot water and several snowy white towels that she set on the large dresser in our room. This apparently was the Scottish equivalent of the morning toilet. I turned to Ann, and she smiled back with a comical grin as if to say “when in Rome…”
We broke our fast in a little room adjoining the lower level pub. Ann and I were seated at a small table and served a traditional breakfast of thick porridge, black pudding and eggs, and scones with strong black tea. It was quite delicious especially since we were famished, and was filling enough to last a farmer the entire day.
We had set aside the first day to see the sights in the immediate area, which was broadly known as the ‘Strathbogie’. A river plane, it consisted of wide grassy fields surrounded by wooded hedges with tall regal hills rising in the distance. Everywhere the air was fresh, with a hint of dew and the smell of the river, still in the distance. Ann found a field of wildflowers at the base of a small hill surrounded by hedges and set up her painting materials. Promising to meet her in time to lunch on the cold beef and rolls that we had received as a pack-lunch, I strolled off in search of the river.
As I started to get closer to the Deveron, the terrain became more rock-strewn and sloped downward, covered everywhere with tiny flowers, tufts of grass, and lichens. The free flowing river was smaller than I imagined, but large enough that covering a salmon pool required a goodly cast.
I sat on the bank and listened to the water growl and murmur. I was simply overjoyed to be in Scotland at last.
Below me and down river some distance I observed several gentlemen standing on the bank at the edge of the water slowly swinging what appeared to be thin medieval lances back and forth. These would be the ‘spey’ rods I had read so much about. A smallish figure scurried between them, and I instinctively knew that he must be the ghillie. After slowly working their way downstream, they rounded a corner and were lost to view.
I wandered the riverbank for a while traveling in an upriver direction, alternately peering into the water, or watching birds.
Excited at the prospect of fishing a beat of river that must not be far from this idyllic area, I lost track of time, and had to hurry back to the waiting Ann and our picnic lunch. She was in no rush either as she had the beginnings of a beautiful watercolor, which if I may say in my biased opinion, paid perfect tribute to the Scottish countryside. Ann was becoming quite the artist.
After our repast, I surprised her with a bottle of champagne I had concealed. We toasted the scenery, the gift of the beautiful day, and finally each other as we drank in both the wine and the equally intoxicating air. Getting a bit snoozy, we stretched out on a blanket we brought and took a pleasant nap under the Scottish sky.
Waking in each other’s arms, we realized it was time to return to the inn if we were to make dinner. The brisk walk through the countryside refreshed us, and I for one was looking forward to supper.
After a short trip to our room for a wash up and a partial change of clothes, Mary once again seated us at a table in the small dining area. There was only one other couple having supper, and we exchanged pleasantries consisting mostly of nods and smiles, as the couple appeared to be Dutch, and spoke very little English.
For supper we were served thick soup of barley and vegetables topped with a thick slice of Angus beef and flowery potatoes. To wash down the meal, a large pot of black tea was provided. Ann and I were enchanted with the meal and the rustic atmosphere and we agreed that we could get used to this!
Feeling full but invigorated, we adjourned to the pub room to partake of the local potables.
The pub was slowly filling with the local characters, and Ann and I were having a ball people watching. Several farmers sat at a table over their pints, looking like a picture out of time, their short pipes slowly adding to the atmosphere of the room as they held an entire conversation made up of short grunts, and replies of “Aye….” Their tweed caps were pulled low over their eyes, and they gave off a sweet scent of the barnyard.
We tried the local porter and two of the various ales that were all delicious, tasting earthy and full-bodied. Bob then recommended that we try a “Wee heavy,” which was an ale intoxicating in it’s full-bodied richness.
By now, other patrons had arrived and were pulling on their pints while discussing the weather, muttering over dominoes, or discussing the abstractions of local sports.
A tall and distinguished looking local who seemed affluent judging from his bespoke jacket and breeks, stood very erect and proper at the bar itself conversing softly with Bob.
It dawned on me suddenly that the only female present in the pub, other than Mary the serving girl, was Ann. In America, she would have been the center of attention, but here in Scotland, she attracted only a quaint smile and a polite tipping of a cap.
I was at the bar ordering us a nightcap of the local Scotch whisky when I noticed a lone figure seated in a dark corner. He was large and wild looking with a massive head of black curly hair that spilled out from under a dirty cap. He wore a coat of indeterminate color, which was buttoned crookedly, and was hunched over his pint of ale, slowly manipulating something in his hands. His eyes were fairly hidden by his thick and unruly eyebrows, but I could tell they were bloodshot.
When Bob came back with the two rather large glasses of amber nectar, I motioned with my head to the lone stranger, curious to know more. Bob furrowed his brows, motioned me closer and whispered “ Tha’ is Dark Hamish, Ya’l nae git much ot’ a ‘im!”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
Bob motioned me over to the other end of the bar, and I followed. “Ee’s a wee daft begger, ee is. Ee’s Twa bubbles aff the centre.” I still looked puzzled and curious so Bob whispered to me “ Ee’s blootered most ‘a ‘da time, and as ‘ee tells it, ‘is Mudder is dead these wee years, and ‘is Fadder died in da war. ‘Ee lives in ‘is parents ‘ouse up on Nobbin hill, and done nae want for company udder den hisself!” Bob winked with a frown and went about his business.
It was hard to penetrate that brogue of his, but I certainly got the gist.
I was about to pick up the drinks and retire to our table when the tall gentleman smiled at me, and introduced himself as Alfred, an Englishman who several years before, charmed by the scenery, had retired to the Strathbogie area. He quickly told me a fuller story of the lone stranger.
It seems that Hamish was the once promising only child of proud parents. His Father was a colonel in the British army and was stationed in China and Burma during the war. He had died in the jungle in ‘44, his body never being recovered. His pension, in addition to other old moneys kept the wife well off. She was an elegant woman of extravagant tastes, and the large Edwardian home was decorated with exotic furnishings of the orient. People recalled that when the mother came to market she was always dressed in the best eastern silks, and bedecked with furs.
Hamish was a well liked but solitary figure that doted on his mother and cared for her during the long illness that finally claimed her. No one seemed to know exactly when she died, as there was no immediate family; both parents being only children as well.
It was after her death that Hamish began to slide to heavy drinking, and sank more and more into himself. He still resided at the old house, but both the home and Hamish now could be described as “a bit sodden and past it.”
Hamish kept himself in fish n’ chips and drink by selling the odd eastern curiosity sent home years ago by his father, and by tying flies for visiting salmon anglers.
Looking back at Hamish it seemed to all make sense. There he sat brooding and whispering to himself with red haunted eyes, lingering over his endless pint, and slowly tying salmon flies on what I now recognized as a thumb vise.
The locals obviously knew him and his habits, as there seemed to be a sort of circle of space around him that no one would invade. The only one I saw approach the table at all was Bob, silently bearing a fresh pint.
By this time, Ann was getting antsy with my absence, but as I returned and we sipped the Scotch, I told her of the story of Dark Hamish. She listened with wide eyes, completely absorbed with the sad tale.
After the scotch, we agreed that we were now quite tired, and that it was time to turn in as tomorrow would see the first day of my salmon fishing, and we would need to make an early start.
I must have been exhausted; I never remember having gone to bed or even undressing, and the next thing I knew the dutiful Mary was awakening us. I arose with a foggy mind and a crimp in my back from some dubious position I must have sunk into in the feather bed, but Ann was well rested and teased me about my little snoring, which to my annoyance she laughingly described as a “choking songbird.”
I dressed in the clothing I had brought along for the purpose of the fly-fishing, corduroy pants, a tattersall shirt, and a Barbour oilskin jacket. Ann wore a beautiful long heather colored skirt and a white cable knit Irish sweater. As Americans, I hoped we would be dressed appropriately as this Scottish salmon fly-fishing was quite a tradition of noblemen and gentlemen, and the dress separated the classes as much as the money and titles did.
We arrived outside the Inn just in time to meet the van from the salmon association that would take us to the beat water I would fish. Seated in the van, Ann and I marveled at the beauty of the scenery as we traveled a rustic road paralleling the river.
We arrived at our destination a little before 9 a.m., and joined the group of anglers standing around a small hut at riverside. Ann set up her easel on the hill overlooking the river.
The anglers introduced themselves, and I was delighted to find that I was not the only rookie to Deveron salmon angling. Ian, a businessman from London who had to be in his late sixties had fished the river several times before, but Connor, a young Irishman in the shipping trade had only fished in his country. Both were dressed in traditional garb of tweed jackets, and both wore ties. I felt the under-dressed yank that I was.
We met our ghillie Angus, who would guide us through the days fishing. Angus was a serious looking lad, not more than a few years older than I was. We soon learned that he was the son of a famous ghillie who had served on the river since the early 1900’s.
My equipment was provided to me as arranged by my father’s friend, and consisted of a fourteen-foot cane rod and matching Perfect Reel built by Hardy. I almost feared using such an expensive outfit for fear of breaking it, but Angus assured me that in all his fathers’ years, only one rod had ever been broken, and that happened when an angler had fallen off an embankment. I promised him, tongue in cheek, to try “not to fall on my arse.”
The two handed or ‘Spey’ flyrod was new to me, and Angus coached us on it’s use, warning: “ye nae pull ‘da line from ‘da water sir”. All three of us practiced swinging the long rod slowly around and behind us, and roll casting it forward. Angus, coaching us constantly, let us know after a half-hour that we were ready enough. I didn’t feel proficient at all, but was amazed at the way I could cover water with the long flyrod.
Connor was to share the upper pool in our allotted beat with another angler we hadn’t met yet, while Angus took Ian and me to the lower pool.
The water I was to fish was a beautiful curving stretch of river with gravel bottom, and containing several underwater boulders which produced tell-tale boils at the surface to let us know they were there. We would mostly be fishing from the bank, but in some areas would wade into the river a few feet. The pool was over three hundred yards long, so dividing it in half, Angus instructed Ian to take the lower stretch, while I would start at the riffle marking the top of the run.
Angus looked at the flies I had tied for the trip, and ignoring the thunder and lightnings and blue charms, he chose a smallish size 6 march brown tied on a Limerick bend hook, and tied it to the leader himself. He instructed me to cast the fly out over the water and follow the swinging fly with the rod as it made its way across the water to dangle beneath me. Then I was to step downstream and repeat the process. He watched my first cast, which was a bit clumsy, nodded his approval, and strutted off to Ian with the last instructions to “shout” if I felt anything happen to the fly, however tiny that might be.
I methodically cast and stepped my way down the run, jealous of Ian’s infinitely superior and graceful casting form that I could observe at will due to being behind him in the water. Neither of us received any pulls from fish in the lower pool, so we gathered back at the fishing hut for a short lunch.
Connor had caught a small grisle (a young yearling salmon) but that was all we had to show for the mornings fishing.
While eating our roast beef and drinking a charming Bordeaux I asked what fly Ian had been using. He kind of smiled and pulled over his rod to reveal a fly like nothing I have ever seen before. It was beautiful in its simplicity and yet rich with color. Its butt was of red wool preceded by a body spun of some natural rich brown fur. The hackle was tan and gray, but it was the wing that intrigued me. It shimmered with translucent colors that changed according to how the light hit them. It was without a doubt the most singularly unique fly that I had ever seen.
“What is it called?” I asked.
“It has no name that I know of,” said Ian.
“Where did it come from, I have never set eyes on anything like it?”
“A local lad ties them.” He replied. “ A sort of strange dark chap. Apparently this is the fly to fish on the Deveron, and the sneaky bastard charged me five pounds for this one fly!”
“No!” I exclaimed.
“Oh aye, he has his own methods for the body and the wing, and try as they might, the ghillies can’t duplicate it. It killed over forty salmon last year alone, often when nary another angler caught more than a chill!” “It’s the only fly I ever fish on this river.”
“But five pounds, for a single fly?”
“Oh aye, and he ties only a few per week, so he always has someone begging for one!”
Suddenly it dawned on me who had tied the fly.
“Is his name perchance Hamish?” I asked.
“Aye, that’s the bugger all right.” Ian scowled.
“The drunken fool would only sell me one of the bloody things, so I threatened the ghillie to tie a good knot, or else!” he remarked.
After our lunch we switched pools, and Ian and I walked to the upper run which was faster and more turbulent than the lower pool. This time I fished farther down, and Ian started at the top of the run.
On my very first cast a boil erupted where the fly was and Angus came running over with instructions to “do nothing, and don’t move!”
He quickly changed the fly to a smaller blue charm and instructed me to back up a few steps and cast again.
Despite two more changes of flies and a dozen casts, the salmon never appeared again, and I resumed my meditative casting and stepping. I couldn’t help feeling that this was my only chance for a salmon come and gone, and my heart sank at the thought.
Suddenly a shout came from upstream, followed by a loud rasping of a Hardy reel in distress. Ian had hooked a salmon!
I reeled in my line and ran after Angus to see the action from up close. The chrome colored salmon was jumping down the length of the pool, launching itself higher each time, and collapsing back into the water with a disturbance that sent bankside birds flying for cover.
Ian’s rod was bent with strain, but his face held an expression of pure joy. It seemed that he had suddenly become younger than his years, as if the salmon was his fountain of youth. Angus stood by with a large net, and whispered encouragement. To my disbelief, the line suddenly went slack, and Ian had a sick look on his face. “Bloody Hell!” he swore, “I lost her!”
“Aye,” said Angus, “and she took the fly too.”
Ian, who had turned red in the face, reeled up the line to disclose a leader devoid of fly.
“Well, I’m done” he said. “I only have confidence in that damn fly the daft bugger ties, and I don’t have another.”
Ian left the pool and walked back in the direction of the hut with shoulders bowed, leaving the water to me.
Despite doing all that Angus instructed, I never did catch a salmon that first day, but had a pleasant time nonetheless. I had read that salmon fishing can kind of be like that, and many an angler much more skilled than I was had gotten the ‘royal skunk’ for days on end before landing their first salmon. Ian had been lucky, or had it been the fly?
I began to wonder.
Angus and I walked back to the fishing hut, and met up with Ann who was being entertained by Irish stories that Connor was telling with flair. She showed me her completed painting, and I was surprised to see myself in the landscape, rod in hand. If nothing else, I would always have the painting to remind me of the Deveron.
It was getting late as the van came along to take us back to the Inn. Ian would be riding with us as well, but would be dropped off a bit earlier than us as he was staying at the top hotel in the district.
Having regained his composure after losing his salmon, Ian surprised us by his knowledge of the countryside, and pointed out places of historical interest as he narrated the trip back with a running commentary. Not far from town, he pointed out a small church that had seen better years, and then lifted his finger to the hill beyond the church and remarked that there on the hill was the house where the “chap who ties the flies” lives.
Ann and I strained to see, but with the falling dusk could only make out a largish gray edifice near the pinnacle of the hill surrounded by trees and ill-kept scrub.
After dropping Ian off we arrived back at the ‘Black Bottle’ just in time to be seated in the dining area and enjoy a thick baked salmon fillet and salad for dinner. Neither Ann nor I felt tired, so we adjourned once more to the pub area. I had forgotten that today was a Friday, but it dawned upon me as I saw the pub already busy with a crowd of locals. Bob welcomed us, and after inquiring after the day’s fishing, treated us to two large amber concoctions he called ‘Highland Liquor’, which tasted like scotch and honey with a hint of lemon and fennel. Both of us felt the heat from the liquor go straight to our heads, and we sat back in our seats in a dreamy state. The warmth in the pub was welcome, for now the locals coming in were dripping with rain, and each time the door opened a misty fog rolled in. The famous Scottish weather had showed it’s fickle face at last.
After enjoying our way through the liquor and tasting two of the local scotches, both Ann and I were feeling a bit tipsy and were glowing inside. I went to the bar to order a couple of pints when I spotted Dark Hamish seated in his usual corner.
It must have been the whisky that gave me courage, but when I saw that he was immersed in tying one of his flies, I couldn’t help myself from going over to get a closer look.
Standing over Hamish I tried to peer closer through my goggle-eyes at what he was doing. As I looked, I noticed a strong odor about him. It was not just the smell of someone who does not bathe, but something worse, like the smell of decay.
He obviously had a sixth sense dedicated to anyone getting too close and invading his private space, because he suddenly looked up and glowered at me while crossing his arms against his stomach to hide the work in progress. “Piss off!” he growled emphatically, his red eyes turned up to me with a fierce and malevolent glare.
Flushed with embarrassment and anger, I made my way back to our table.
I quickly explained to Ann what had transpired, as she had only witnessed the exchange from a distance. For some protective reason, she was angrier than I was about the whole thing. I had just wanted a peek at how the infamous and striking flies he tied were constructed. I certainly never meant to start an incident.
A long-time friend of Ann’s back home once warned me about my fiancee, stating that she was “passionate and impulsive.” Until that moment I didn’t recognize the full extent of the warning.
“I have an idea!” Ann sort of purred. “Let’s borrow the bicycles that the pub keeps for the tourists, and go up to his house.”
“Your mad!” I said.
“No, really, it’s only a mile or so, it would be easy.”
“Why in the world...”
“Because you know you want to.” “Besides, I know you well enough to be sure that you would do almost anything to get a look at that fly, you obsessive nut!”
“Not obsessive…. Just well, interested. Right?”
“Besides, it would be a blast to see how this guy lives; and… no one tells my future hubby to “piss off”.”
I realized at this point that I must be fairly drunk, as I still did not fully understand Ann’s idea, but with foggy eyes I made my way to the bar, gesturing for Bob and asked him for the loan of the two bicycles.
“ Y’er nae goun oot thar?, its rainin' auld wives and pipe staples.” Bob cried with concern. “Yeel catch a death, ‘sides y’er a bit blootered yeself.”
Despite Bob’s concerns, Ann and I donned our weatherproofs, grabbed the bikes from the former stable behind the pub, and warmed with liquor and giggling, tottered off unsteadily into the rain.
I was having a hard time keeping the bike on the road, as the old WWII vintage Huffy seemed to have a mind of it’s own.
I followed Ann as best I could with the rain fogging up my glasses, and kept begging her to slow down, to which she just shot back teasing giggles.
As we wobbled down the country road, I kept wondering about what the end game to this silliness would entail, and how we would be able to see anything anyway. By now cold and wet, I was beginning to regret going along with Ann’s craziness when she gave a little cry and pointed directly to our right where I could barely make out the silhouette of the old church.
“Let’s stash the bikes here, and sneak up to the house,” she said with a mischievous smile, her face dripping with rain. Sobered somewhat by the chill and wet, I lead the way past the church and up to the old house using its single dimly lit window as my guide.
The old house was large and squarely shaped, with two stories topped by a widow’s walk with collapsing iron railings. It possessed a forgotten charm tainted by neglect and decay. I kept tripping over unseen debris hidden in the long clumps of weeds inhabiting the yard, but slowly led Anne to the window that was barely illuminated from within.
It was full of dust, and so dirty that we could hardly see in. I could barely make out a crowded and messy table on which sat a single kerosene lamp that cast dark shadows about the room.
“Let’s try the door and see if it’s locked.” I said.
Ann looked less enthusiastic now than she did when starting out.
“Maybe we should just go back.” She whispered.
“Not on your life.” I replied. “You started this goofy idea, and now that we are out here and he is back inside the pub, we at least can have a little look-see.”
I made my way up to the porch, and slowly ascended the stairs, picking my way between the gaps and holes that had opened in the rotting wood, and avoiding the broken furniture which lay strewn about. While Ann waited below, I tried the door only to find it locked. Jumping down to the lawn, I towed Ann by the arm to the side and rear of the house looking for any other entrance or window to see into. In the rear of the old house stood a large shed, leaning slightly with the same general state of decay as the house. Ann thought she spotted another light in a rear window, and I told her to go check it out while I looked into the crooked shed.
The door to the shed was loose, and an old sock that was tied to two nails served as the upper hinge. Entering the small single room, I could just barely make out a table and chair, several large boxes or crates, and various clothes or such hanging about. The air was filled with a stink of dried animal skins and mothballs. Excited that I might have found where Hamish tied his flies, I got out a box of matches and struck one to produce a little light. By the dim flickering flame, I saw that the table indeed did have a vise clamped to it, and moving forward to investigate, my feet scattered some empty beer bottles lying on the floor. Several moths and smaller flying bugs careened and circled in front of me obviously attracted to the light from the match.
In the vise was one of his flies in progress, and strewn about the table were several pieces of an old moth-eaten fox stole that he must be using for the fur body of the fly. That was probably the source of the bugs. The match by now had burned down to my finger, and I lit another as I peered closer to the fly. Long threads of many colors hung off of the half completed wing, and trailed across the table to a large piece of cloth partially emerging from a sizable wooden crate in the corner of the room. I looked closer at the threads and cloth and realized that here was Hamish’s secret. He seemed to be using the colorful loose threads, which looked to be of silk, to combine or ‘marry’ together and form the exquisite shimmering wings on the fly. How clever!
I leaned over next to the table and pulled at the silk cloth itself, causing the loose lid of the crate to slide off and clatter to the floor on its side.
Bending forward with the match, I was met with a sudden increase in the stench of decay. There in the crate was the source of the wing material; a silk robe or dress of extravagant beauty, and obviously of oriental origin. I moved my hand over the silk, dislodging the robe a bit in the process. Between the layers of silk lay a large object of some mass and vague twisted shape. I moved the match closer to reveal what appeared to be a brown oblong shape with a dark hole off to one side and covered with a parched sort of dried leather and hair that….
I stood up with shock, hitting my head on something and putting out the match. As I turned for the door in the darkness the full recognition of what lay in the crate hit me with the force of a macabre sledgehammer, causing involuntary shivers to run down my spine.
It was his mother. His mother…It could be no one else, dead and desiccated with mummified skin whose partial head and face I had briefly but horribly stared into.
Stumbling from the hut, I ran into Ann coming towards me and opening her mouth to say something. Not losing a step, I grabbed her, clamping my hand around her mouth and surrounding her in my arms, half carrying and dragging her toward the bicycles.
Somehow we made it back to the Inn, although the only thing I remembered afterwards is Ann’s pleading questions as to my state of mind, and passing a hunched dark figure on the road that must have been Hamish, on his way back home to his tortured existence and God only knows what other secret horrors he had hidden away.
That night while tossing in my half-sleep, I couldn’t stop dwelling on the horror in the little shed. I thought of Dark Hamish, sitting with his bloodshot eyes next to his mother’s body in the old crate, surrounded by the stench of decay, and weaving her old silk robe and fox stole into his sick creations. It made my skin crawl to think of the gentlemen proudly using those flies, utterly unaware of their horrible genesis.
In the morning I was ill with fever and beaded with sweat. Unable and unwilling to face salmon fishing or anything else for that matter, I stayed in bed, forgoing my fishing rights for the day, and being nursed by Ann with broth made especially by Mary, which she guaranteed would soon “set me right.”
Ann and I have been married twelve years to the month now, but I never have told her what I saw in the shed, and she has finally stopped asking. For several years afterwards I had problems going into antique shops, and still dislike dark enclosed spaces.
Now and then I awake in the night in a sweat, recalling with startling clarity that horrible partial face, and the bugs crawling out of its eye sockets.
By Erik Helm
It was in the late summer of 1957 that my fiancee Ann and I traveled to Scotland as a sort of pre-marriage honeymoon. Ann was interested in the unique Scottish scenery and as an artist, was looking forward to painting and sketching landscapes. I was going to see the land of my distant ancestors, and to fish for salmon on the Deveron River. The whole trip was to be inexpensive, as we had booked the steamship tickets second class, and received the fishing rights from a wealthy friend of my father’s as an early wedding present. Salmon fishing in Scotland is a sport of the wealthy, and in order to keep it that way clubs and associations control both river access and fishing. One can’t just go down to the river and fish, but instead must buy memberships or purchase time on the water. I would never have afforded it on my own without being given the fishing as a gift.
I had prepared for the trip by tying dozens of traditional salmon flies. An avid fly tier, I owned the books by Kelson and Pryce-Tannatt, and was captivated by the colors and curves of their salmon flies.
Arriving anxiously after the long sea voyage, Ann and I checked in to our lodgings near the town of Huntly; a public house called the “Black Bottle.” A charming stone and wood two-story building dating from Tudor times, it consisted of a darkly lit but comfortable pub and separate small dining area on the first floor, and three bedrooms on the second.
The first thing we noticed when we entered the pub was the warmth of the fire, which both provided much of the illumination, and beckoned the chilled traveler to sit awhile and enjoy a pint of ale. It may still have been late summer, but the unpredictable damp Scottish weather could turn downright chilly. The barroom had long tables and benches that were heavy and made of oak. They were darkened with the smoke of the fire, spilled porter, and the sweat of the travelers and locals who found solace hunched over their pints.
The walls were of beam and stucco and seemed as old as the hills. The décor was sparse, consisting of mostly old faded pictures of local scenery, portraits of famous Scotsmen cut from books, and a few tantalizing photos of anglers dressed in tweeds and holding their proud catches. Several rusted pieces of armor dating from the period of the English Civil War hung behind the bar itself. One I recognized as an excellent example of a lobster-pot helmet.
The rear of the bar consisted of small casks of spirits, and various bottles. Centered over the bar was the namesake for the pub, a leather flask or bottle of prodigious size dating from the late medieval period.
On the whole I found the pub itself to be rustic and charming. As a graduate student in history, I preferred local color to any mass appeal hotel anyway, and the description given by my father’s friend in his recommendation of the Inn did it justice. Ann turned to me smiling, and indicated her approval.
The innkeeper and pub owner, a ruddy faced and portly man with a thick red beard, who introduced himself only as ‘Bob’, showed us up the creaking staircase to our room. He explained that the hostess ‘Mary’ was in town at market and would be back shortly to see to our needs.
In contrast to the dim and dark pub, the second floor was clean and well lit. Our room was small, (Ann, always the optimist, called it cozy), and featured a wood framed feather bed and a view encompassing the immediate countryside, and on the horizon, the Deveron. Ann was thrilled with the scenery, and couldn’t wait to set up her little portable easel and watercolors. It may have been only 4 p.m., but we were very tired from the long bumpy bus-ride to the Inn, and instead of sallying forth, we just collapsed into the featherbed.
The next morning’s sun had barely began to burn off the moist fog when we were awakened by Mary bearing a large bowl of hot water and several snowy white towels that she set on the large dresser in our room. This apparently was the Scottish equivalent of the morning toilet. I turned to Ann, and she smiled back with a comical grin as if to say “when in Rome…”
We broke our fast in a little room adjoining the lower level pub. Ann and I were seated at a small table and served a traditional breakfast of thick porridge, black pudding and eggs, and scones with strong black tea. It was quite delicious especially since we were famished, and was filling enough to last a farmer the entire day.
We had set aside the first day to see the sights in the immediate area, which was broadly known as the ‘Strathbogie’. A river plane, it consisted of wide grassy fields surrounded by wooded hedges with tall regal hills rising in the distance. Everywhere the air was fresh, with a hint of dew and the smell of the river, still in the distance. Ann found a field of wildflowers at the base of a small hill surrounded by hedges and set up her painting materials. Promising to meet her in time to lunch on the cold beef and rolls that we had received as a pack-lunch, I strolled off in search of the river.
As I started to get closer to the Deveron, the terrain became more rock-strewn and sloped downward, covered everywhere with tiny flowers, tufts of grass, and lichens. The free flowing river was smaller than I imagined, but large enough that covering a salmon pool required a goodly cast.
I sat on the bank and listened to the water growl and murmur. I was simply overjoyed to be in Scotland at last.
Below me and down river some distance I observed several gentlemen standing on the bank at the edge of the water slowly swinging what appeared to be thin medieval lances back and forth. These would be the ‘spey’ rods I had read so much about. A smallish figure scurried between them, and I instinctively knew that he must be the ghillie. After slowly working their way downstream, they rounded a corner and were lost to view.
I wandered the riverbank for a while traveling in an upriver direction, alternately peering into the water, or watching birds.
Excited at the prospect of fishing a beat of river that must not be far from this idyllic area, I lost track of time, and had to hurry back to the waiting Ann and our picnic lunch. She was in no rush either as she had the beginnings of a beautiful watercolor, which if I may say in my biased opinion, paid perfect tribute to the Scottish countryside. Ann was becoming quite the artist.
After our repast, I surprised her with a bottle of champagne I had concealed. We toasted the scenery, the gift of the beautiful day, and finally each other as we drank in both the wine and the equally intoxicating air. Getting a bit snoozy, we stretched out on a blanket we brought and took a pleasant nap under the Scottish sky.
Waking in each other’s arms, we realized it was time to return to the inn if we were to make dinner. The brisk walk through the countryside refreshed us, and I for one was looking forward to supper.
After a short trip to our room for a wash up and a partial change of clothes, Mary once again seated us at a table in the small dining area. There was only one other couple having supper, and we exchanged pleasantries consisting mostly of nods and smiles, as the couple appeared to be Dutch, and spoke very little English.
For supper we were served thick soup of barley and vegetables topped with a thick slice of Angus beef and flowery potatoes. To wash down the meal, a large pot of black tea was provided. Ann and I were enchanted with the meal and the rustic atmosphere and we agreed that we could get used to this!
Feeling full but invigorated, we adjourned to the pub room to partake of the local potables.
The pub was slowly filling with the local characters, and Ann and I were having a ball people watching. Several farmers sat at a table over their pints, looking like a picture out of time, their short pipes slowly adding to the atmosphere of the room as they held an entire conversation made up of short grunts, and replies of “Aye….” Their tweed caps were pulled low over their eyes, and they gave off a sweet scent of the barnyard.
We tried the local porter and two of the various ales that were all delicious, tasting earthy and full-bodied. Bob then recommended that we try a “Wee heavy,” which was an ale intoxicating in it’s full-bodied richness.
By now, other patrons had arrived and were pulling on their pints while discussing the weather, muttering over dominoes, or discussing the abstractions of local sports.
A tall and distinguished looking local who seemed affluent judging from his bespoke jacket and breeks, stood very erect and proper at the bar itself conversing softly with Bob.
It dawned on me suddenly that the only female present in the pub, other than Mary the serving girl, was Ann. In America, she would have been the center of attention, but here in Scotland, she attracted only a quaint smile and a polite tipping of a cap.
I was at the bar ordering us a nightcap of the local Scotch whisky when I noticed a lone figure seated in a dark corner. He was large and wild looking with a massive head of black curly hair that spilled out from under a dirty cap. He wore a coat of indeterminate color, which was buttoned crookedly, and was hunched over his pint of ale, slowly manipulating something in his hands. His eyes were fairly hidden by his thick and unruly eyebrows, but I could tell they were bloodshot.
When Bob came back with the two rather large glasses of amber nectar, I motioned with my head to the lone stranger, curious to know more. Bob furrowed his brows, motioned me closer and whispered “ Tha’ is Dark Hamish, Ya’l nae git much ot’ a ‘im!”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
Bob motioned me over to the other end of the bar, and I followed. “Ee’s a wee daft begger, ee is. Ee’s Twa bubbles aff the centre.” I still looked puzzled and curious so Bob whispered to me “ Ee’s blootered most ‘a ‘da time, and as ‘ee tells it, ‘is Mudder is dead these wee years, and ‘is Fadder died in da war. ‘Ee lives in ‘is parents ‘ouse up on Nobbin hill, and done nae want for company udder den hisself!” Bob winked with a frown and went about his business.
It was hard to penetrate that brogue of his, but I certainly got the gist.
I was about to pick up the drinks and retire to our table when the tall gentleman smiled at me, and introduced himself as Alfred, an Englishman who several years before, charmed by the scenery, had retired to the Strathbogie area. He quickly told me a fuller story of the lone stranger.
It seems that Hamish was the once promising only child of proud parents. His Father was a colonel in the British army and was stationed in China and Burma during the war. He had died in the jungle in ‘44, his body never being recovered. His pension, in addition to other old moneys kept the wife well off. She was an elegant woman of extravagant tastes, and the large Edwardian home was decorated with exotic furnishings of the orient. People recalled that when the mother came to market she was always dressed in the best eastern silks, and bedecked with furs.
Hamish was a well liked but solitary figure that doted on his mother and cared for her during the long illness that finally claimed her. No one seemed to know exactly when she died, as there was no immediate family; both parents being only children as well.
It was after her death that Hamish began to slide to heavy drinking, and sank more and more into himself. He still resided at the old house, but both the home and Hamish now could be described as “a bit sodden and past it.”
Hamish kept himself in fish n’ chips and drink by selling the odd eastern curiosity sent home years ago by his father, and by tying flies for visiting salmon anglers.
Looking back at Hamish it seemed to all make sense. There he sat brooding and whispering to himself with red haunted eyes, lingering over his endless pint, and slowly tying salmon flies on what I now recognized as a thumb vise.
The locals obviously knew him and his habits, as there seemed to be a sort of circle of space around him that no one would invade. The only one I saw approach the table at all was Bob, silently bearing a fresh pint.
By this time, Ann was getting antsy with my absence, but as I returned and we sipped the Scotch, I told her of the story of Dark Hamish. She listened with wide eyes, completely absorbed with the sad tale.
After the scotch, we agreed that we were now quite tired, and that it was time to turn in as tomorrow would see the first day of my salmon fishing, and we would need to make an early start.
I must have been exhausted; I never remember having gone to bed or even undressing, and the next thing I knew the dutiful Mary was awakening us. I arose with a foggy mind and a crimp in my back from some dubious position I must have sunk into in the feather bed, but Ann was well rested and teased me about my little snoring, which to my annoyance she laughingly described as a “choking songbird.”
I dressed in the clothing I had brought along for the purpose of the fly-fishing, corduroy pants, a tattersall shirt, and a Barbour oilskin jacket. Ann wore a beautiful long heather colored skirt and a white cable knit Irish sweater. As Americans, I hoped we would be dressed appropriately as this Scottish salmon fly-fishing was quite a tradition of noblemen and gentlemen, and the dress separated the classes as much as the money and titles did.
We arrived outside the Inn just in time to meet the van from the salmon association that would take us to the beat water I would fish. Seated in the van, Ann and I marveled at the beauty of the scenery as we traveled a rustic road paralleling the river.
We arrived at our destination a little before 9 a.m., and joined the group of anglers standing around a small hut at riverside. Ann set up her easel on the hill overlooking the river.
The anglers introduced themselves, and I was delighted to find that I was not the only rookie to Deveron salmon angling. Ian, a businessman from London who had to be in his late sixties had fished the river several times before, but Connor, a young Irishman in the shipping trade had only fished in his country. Both were dressed in traditional garb of tweed jackets, and both wore ties. I felt the under-dressed yank that I was.
We met our ghillie Angus, who would guide us through the days fishing. Angus was a serious looking lad, not more than a few years older than I was. We soon learned that he was the son of a famous ghillie who had served on the river since the early 1900’s.
My equipment was provided to me as arranged by my father’s friend, and consisted of a fourteen-foot cane rod and matching Perfect Reel built by Hardy. I almost feared using such an expensive outfit for fear of breaking it, but Angus assured me that in all his fathers’ years, only one rod had ever been broken, and that happened when an angler had fallen off an embankment. I promised him, tongue in cheek, to try “not to fall on my arse.”
The two handed or ‘Spey’ flyrod was new to me, and Angus coached us on it’s use, warning: “ye nae pull ‘da line from ‘da water sir”. All three of us practiced swinging the long rod slowly around and behind us, and roll casting it forward. Angus, coaching us constantly, let us know after a half-hour that we were ready enough. I didn’t feel proficient at all, but was amazed at the way I could cover water with the long flyrod.
Connor was to share the upper pool in our allotted beat with another angler we hadn’t met yet, while Angus took Ian and me to the lower pool.
The water I was to fish was a beautiful curving stretch of river with gravel bottom, and containing several underwater boulders which produced tell-tale boils at the surface to let us know they were there. We would mostly be fishing from the bank, but in some areas would wade into the river a few feet. The pool was over three hundred yards long, so dividing it in half, Angus instructed Ian to take the lower stretch, while I would start at the riffle marking the top of the run.
Angus looked at the flies I had tied for the trip, and ignoring the thunder and lightnings and blue charms, he chose a smallish size 6 march brown tied on a Limerick bend hook, and tied it to the leader himself. He instructed me to cast the fly out over the water and follow the swinging fly with the rod as it made its way across the water to dangle beneath me. Then I was to step downstream and repeat the process. He watched my first cast, which was a bit clumsy, nodded his approval, and strutted off to Ian with the last instructions to “shout” if I felt anything happen to the fly, however tiny that might be.
I methodically cast and stepped my way down the run, jealous of Ian’s infinitely superior and graceful casting form that I could observe at will due to being behind him in the water. Neither of us received any pulls from fish in the lower pool, so we gathered back at the fishing hut for a short lunch.
Connor had caught a small grisle (a young yearling salmon) but that was all we had to show for the mornings fishing.
While eating our roast beef and drinking a charming Bordeaux I asked what fly Ian had been using. He kind of smiled and pulled over his rod to reveal a fly like nothing I have ever seen before. It was beautiful in its simplicity and yet rich with color. Its butt was of red wool preceded by a body spun of some natural rich brown fur. The hackle was tan and gray, but it was the wing that intrigued me. It shimmered with translucent colors that changed according to how the light hit them. It was without a doubt the most singularly unique fly that I had ever seen.
“What is it called?” I asked.
“It has no name that I know of,” said Ian.
“Where did it come from, I have never set eyes on anything like it?”
“A local lad ties them.” He replied. “ A sort of strange dark chap. Apparently this is the fly to fish on the Deveron, and the sneaky bastard charged me five pounds for this one fly!”
“No!” I exclaimed.
“Oh aye, he has his own methods for the body and the wing, and try as they might, the ghillies can’t duplicate it. It killed over forty salmon last year alone, often when nary another angler caught more than a chill!” “It’s the only fly I ever fish on this river.”
“But five pounds, for a single fly?”
“Oh aye, and he ties only a few per week, so he always has someone begging for one!”
Suddenly it dawned on me who had tied the fly.
“Is his name perchance Hamish?” I asked.
“Aye, that’s the bugger all right.” Ian scowled.
“The drunken fool would only sell me one of the bloody things, so I threatened the ghillie to tie a good knot, or else!” he remarked.
After our lunch we switched pools, and Ian and I walked to the upper run which was faster and more turbulent than the lower pool. This time I fished farther down, and Ian started at the top of the run.
On my very first cast a boil erupted where the fly was and Angus came running over with instructions to “do nothing, and don’t move!”
He quickly changed the fly to a smaller blue charm and instructed me to back up a few steps and cast again.
Despite two more changes of flies and a dozen casts, the salmon never appeared again, and I resumed my meditative casting and stepping. I couldn’t help feeling that this was my only chance for a salmon come and gone, and my heart sank at the thought.
Suddenly a shout came from upstream, followed by a loud rasping of a Hardy reel in distress. Ian had hooked a salmon!
I reeled in my line and ran after Angus to see the action from up close. The chrome colored salmon was jumping down the length of the pool, launching itself higher each time, and collapsing back into the water with a disturbance that sent bankside birds flying for cover.
Ian’s rod was bent with strain, but his face held an expression of pure joy. It seemed that he had suddenly become younger than his years, as if the salmon was his fountain of youth. Angus stood by with a large net, and whispered encouragement. To my disbelief, the line suddenly went slack, and Ian had a sick look on his face. “Bloody Hell!” he swore, “I lost her!”
“Aye,” said Angus, “and she took the fly too.”
Ian, who had turned red in the face, reeled up the line to disclose a leader devoid of fly.
“Well, I’m done” he said. “I only have confidence in that damn fly the daft bugger ties, and I don’t have another.”
Ian left the pool and walked back in the direction of the hut with shoulders bowed, leaving the water to me.
Despite doing all that Angus instructed, I never did catch a salmon that first day, but had a pleasant time nonetheless. I had read that salmon fishing can kind of be like that, and many an angler much more skilled than I was had gotten the ‘royal skunk’ for days on end before landing their first salmon. Ian had been lucky, or had it been the fly?
I began to wonder.
Angus and I walked back to the fishing hut, and met up with Ann who was being entertained by Irish stories that Connor was telling with flair. She showed me her completed painting, and I was surprised to see myself in the landscape, rod in hand. If nothing else, I would always have the painting to remind me of the Deveron.
It was getting late as the van came along to take us back to the Inn. Ian would be riding with us as well, but would be dropped off a bit earlier than us as he was staying at the top hotel in the district.
Having regained his composure after losing his salmon, Ian surprised us by his knowledge of the countryside, and pointed out places of historical interest as he narrated the trip back with a running commentary. Not far from town, he pointed out a small church that had seen better years, and then lifted his finger to the hill beyond the church and remarked that there on the hill was the house where the “chap who ties the flies” lives.
Ann and I strained to see, but with the falling dusk could only make out a largish gray edifice near the pinnacle of the hill surrounded by trees and ill-kept scrub.
After dropping Ian off we arrived back at the ‘Black Bottle’ just in time to be seated in the dining area and enjoy a thick baked salmon fillet and salad for dinner. Neither Ann nor I felt tired, so we adjourned once more to the pub area. I had forgotten that today was a Friday, but it dawned upon me as I saw the pub already busy with a crowd of locals. Bob welcomed us, and after inquiring after the day’s fishing, treated us to two large amber concoctions he called ‘Highland Liquor’, which tasted like scotch and honey with a hint of lemon and fennel. Both of us felt the heat from the liquor go straight to our heads, and we sat back in our seats in a dreamy state. The warmth in the pub was welcome, for now the locals coming in were dripping with rain, and each time the door opened a misty fog rolled in. The famous Scottish weather had showed it’s fickle face at last.
After enjoying our way through the liquor and tasting two of the local scotches, both Ann and I were feeling a bit tipsy and were glowing inside. I went to the bar to order a couple of pints when I spotted Dark Hamish seated in his usual corner.
It must have been the whisky that gave me courage, but when I saw that he was immersed in tying one of his flies, I couldn’t help myself from going over to get a closer look.
Standing over Hamish I tried to peer closer through my goggle-eyes at what he was doing. As I looked, I noticed a strong odor about him. It was not just the smell of someone who does not bathe, but something worse, like the smell of decay.
He obviously had a sixth sense dedicated to anyone getting too close and invading his private space, because he suddenly looked up and glowered at me while crossing his arms against his stomach to hide the work in progress. “Piss off!” he growled emphatically, his red eyes turned up to me with a fierce and malevolent glare.
Flushed with embarrassment and anger, I made my way back to our table.
I quickly explained to Ann what had transpired, as she had only witnessed the exchange from a distance. For some protective reason, she was angrier than I was about the whole thing. I had just wanted a peek at how the infamous and striking flies he tied were constructed. I certainly never meant to start an incident.
A long-time friend of Ann’s back home once warned me about my fiancee, stating that she was “passionate and impulsive.” Until that moment I didn’t recognize the full extent of the warning.
“I have an idea!” Ann sort of purred. “Let’s borrow the bicycles that the pub keeps for the tourists, and go up to his house.”
“Your mad!” I said.
“No, really, it’s only a mile or so, it would be easy.”
“Why in the world...”
“Because you know you want to.” “Besides, I know you well enough to be sure that you would do almost anything to get a look at that fly, you obsessive nut!”
“Not obsessive…. Just well, interested. Right?”
“Besides, it would be a blast to see how this guy lives; and… no one tells my future hubby to “piss off”.”
I realized at this point that I must be fairly drunk, as I still did not fully understand Ann’s idea, but with foggy eyes I made my way to the bar, gesturing for Bob and asked him for the loan of the two bicycles.
“ Y’er nae goun oot thar?, its rainin' auld wives and pipe staples.” Bob cried with concern. “Yeel catch a death, ‘sides y’er a bit blootered yeself.”
Despite Bob’s concerns, Ann and I donned our weatherproofs, grabbed the bikes from the former stable behind the pub, and warmed with liquor and giggling, tottered off unsteadily into the rain.
I was having a hard time keeping the bike on the road, as the old WWII vintage Huffy seemed to have a mind of it’s own.
I followed Ann as best I could with the rain fogging up my glasses, and kept begging her to slow down, to which she just shot back teasing giggles.
As we wobbled down the country road, I kept wondering about what the end game to this silliness would entail, and how we would be able to see anything anyway. By now cold and wet, I was beginning to regret going along with Ann’s craziness when she gave a little cry and pointed directly to our right where I could barely make out the silhouette of the old church.
“Let’s stash the bikes here, and sneak up to the house,” she said with a mischievous smile, her face dripping with rain. Sobered somewhat by the chill and wet, I lead the way past the church and up to the old house using its single dimly lit window as my guide.
The old house was large and squarely shaped, with two stories topped by a widow’s walk with collapsing iron railings. It possessed a forgotten charm tainted by neglect and decay. I kept tripping over unseen debris hidden in the long clumps of weeds inhabiting the yard, but slowly led Anne to the window that was barely illuminated from within.
It was full of dust, and so dirty that we could hardly see in. I could barely make out a crowded and messy table on which sat a single kerosene lamp that cast dark shadows about the room.
“Let’s try the door and see if it’s locked.” I said.
Ann looked less enthusiastic now than she did when starting out.
“Maybe we should just go back.” She whispered.
“Not on your life.” I replied. “You started this goofy idea, and now that we are out here and he is back inside the pub, we at least can have a little look-see.”
I made my way up to the porch, and slowly ascended the stairs, picking my way between the gaps and holes that had opened in the rotting wood, and avoiding the broken furniture which lay strewn about. While Ann waited below, I tried the door only to find it locked. Jumping down to the lawn, I towed Ann by the arm to the side and rear of the house looking for any other entrance or window to see into. In the rear of the old house stood a large shed, leaning slightly with the same general state of decay as the house. Ann thought she spotted another light in a rear window, and I told her to go check it out while I looked into the crooked shed.
The door to the shed was loose, and an old sock that was tied to two nails served as the upper hinge. Entering the small single room, I could just barely make out a table and chair, several large boxes or crates, and various clothes or such hanging about. The air was filled with a stink of dried animal skins and mothballs. Excited that I might have found where Hamish tied his flies, I got out a box of matches and struck one to produce a little light. By the dim flickering flame, I saw that the table indeed did have a vise clamped to it, and moving forward to investigate, my feet scattered some empty beer bottles lying on the floor. Several moths and smaller flying bugs careened and circled in front of me obviously attracted to the light from the match.
In the vise was one of his flies in progress, and strewn about the table were several pieces of an old moth-eaten fox stole that he must be using for the fur body of the fly. That was probably the source of the bugs. The match by now had burned down to my finger, and I lit another as I peered closer to the fly. Long threads of many colors hung off of the half completed wing, and trailed across the table to a large piece of cloth partially emerging from a sizable wooden crate in the corner of the room. I looked closer at the threads and cloth and realized that here was Hamish’s secret. He seemed to be using the colorful loose threads, which looked to be of silk, to combine or ‘marry’ together and form the exquisite shimmering wings on the fly. How clever!
I leaned over next to the table and pulled at the silk cloth itself, causing the loose lid of the crate to slide off and clatter to the floor on its side.
Bending forward with the match, I was met with a sudden increase in the stench of decay. There in the crate was the source of the wing material; a silk robe or dress of extravagant beauty, and obviously of oriental origin. I moved my hand over the silk, dislodging the robe a bit in the process. Between the layers of silk lay a large object of some mass and vague twisted shape. I moved the match closer to reveal what appeared to be a brown oblong shape with a dark hole off to one side and covered with a parched sort of dried leather and hair that….
I stood up with shock, hitting my head on something and putting out the match. As I turned for the door in the darkness the full recognition of what lay in the crate hit me with the force of a macabre sledgehammer, causing involuntary shivers to run down my spine.
It was his mother. His mother…It could be no one else, dead and desiccated with mummified skin whose partial head and face I had briefly but horribly stared into.
Stumbling from the hut, I ran into Ann coming towards me and opening her mouth to say something. Not losing a step, I grabbed her, clamping my hand around her mouth and surrounding her in my arms, half carrying and dragging her toward the bicycles.
Somehow we made it back to the Inn, although the only thing I remembered afterwards is Ann’s pleading questions as to my state of mind, and passing a hunched dark figure on the road that must have been Hamish, on his way back home to his tortured existence and God only knows what other secret horrors he had hidden away.
That night while tossing in my half-sleep, I couldn’t stop dwelling on the horror in the little shed. I thought of Dark Hamish, sitting with his bloodshot eyes next to his mother’s body in the old crate, surrounded by the stench of decay, and weaving her old silk robe and fox stole into his sick creations. It made my skin crawl to think of the gentlemen proudly using those flies, utterly unaware of their horrible genesis.
In the morning I was ill with fever and beaded with sweat. Unable and unwilling to face salmon fishing or anything else for that matter, I stayed in bed, forgoing my fishing rights for the day, and being nursed by Ann with broth made especially by Mary, which she guaranteed would soon “set me right.”
Ann and I have been married twelve years to the month now, but I never have told her what I saw in the shed, and she has finally stopped asking. For several years afterwards I had problems going into antique shops, and still dislike dark enclosed spaces.
Now and then I awake in the night in a sweat, recalling with startling clarity that horrible partial face, and the bugs crawling out of its eye sockets.
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