The Pace of Things

I’m not sure what to say.

I started this blog mainly as a fishing journal that could incorporate photographs. Indeed, I often look back at old posts to remember when something happened, so it has served that purpose, but I also know that a few other people read my blog from time to time to see what I have been up to. I didn’t want to bore them, or to overwhelm them with too many posts, so I didn’t write about every fishing trip, I just tried to pick out the best things to write about. These days, however, I am fishing so much that it’s difficult to even settle on one thing. I do realize that it’s a great luxury to have this problem, but it is a new and slightly overwhelming feeling.

One thing that struck me this year was the pace of the seasons. I have lived in the tropics for so long that I had forgotten how quickly things change. Days on the water begin to blur together, and my collection of photographs, of places explored and fish caught, quickly builds up. My memories of searching for carp under snow-dusted hills seem so recent, but much has happened since then. The cold mornings have passed, the spawn has come and gone, and mid-summer has arrived, bringing its bounty to the riverbanks:

Wildfires are springing up in the hills, so each day is a battle between the wind and the smoke-haze. My new waders have sprung a small leak, which I am choosing to ignore until fall. I have to replace an o-ring on the skiff before Makani arrives for a quick visit on his way to Alaska, and after that we are off on a trip to Japan. Life doesn’t appear to be slowing down, but I just take things fish by fish.