The One

Once several decades of familiarity with rivers, an angler learns their heartbeats, their moods. A certain bond develops. I sensed there was a new player in one of my haunts, a new uncatchable trout has taken residence perhaps. But once pondering, it might just as easily that he has been there for some time, growing, biding his time to take mastery.

There are certain lies which linger in the memory, not for catches, but for the lack of them. Everything looks right, and yet, that lie fails to produce. Not just a season mind you, but over many. Thinking back recently, I do recall some evidence. A movement just as a fly has ended it’s drift and a gentle raising of the rod tip swims it away. Not a take, no, not even quite a follow, simply… movement.

There were bits of evidence over time, enough so that a suspicion had formed and then, last week, well, there were those damned fluttering moths. Idly watching one of those cavorting and bouncing down there, and just as I was looking away came the explosion. I’ve got you!

With the game afoot, and obviously I danced my own pattern over and past, twitched and manipulated right then and there, but for nothing. Fishing was good, and he could wait. You cannot put one over on a fish like that with a change of fly or three. No. Time, patience, approach and technique are necessary. He wasn’t going anywhere.

So, we started with the formal courting. A guided, careful approach at every opportunity, considering the conditions, and making a group of casts just so. Failure is very much a part of this game. Fish him too much, target him enough for him to recognize he has been targeted, and he will dissolve in the mists.

And so, when the day had come, I made that bad decision, worked it out in my mind and decided what was best, and it would cost me. Delicacy was needed you see, for the perfect cast, the presentation is paramount in these situations. I felt that a three weight was the answer. The Menscer Three would be sublime: distance, delicacy, accuracy, in straight forward terms, perfection! Ah, but what size of warrior was I up against! Dare I risk perfection? I took down the evil rolled and baked substitute, this manufactured soulless thing, graphite.

At the moment of the first meeting, bamboo bestows it’s grace, subtly, beautifully, and my hand has accustomed to it, to reply upon it seems. In short, that bad decision cost me two very large trout that day, broken at that first moment, our first meeting. But it was not, The One. Perhaps my hand was swiftly seasoned by those bad experiences, or greater distance between us simply allowed an ounce of stretch between us to protect that thin tippet.

I had come knocking, softly early. Careful not to wake the master of his abode, to disturb him with my presence should he not yet be ready to welcome callers. He wasn’t, and I withdrew as quietly.

Hours later in the morning I returned, though there was no visible activity still. Discreet distance, plenty of leader, and just the right fly at the ready, I knocked again…

The take was somewhat bold, not soft nor hard, but confident. Clearly, he what he wanted. The explosion came half a heartbeat later!

He clearly wanted to stay in his living room, I had a necessity to lead him out onto his lawn where we could dance, without the bother of his various implements, and dance we did! That light rod and the diminutive Hardy protested on my end, he cavorting with boils and somersaults, twists and turns and a good measure of brute force expended toward me on his.