I'm a fly fisherman down to the bone. I don't know what it is but I just can't get enough of it. In the last two months three fly fishing greats have suffered an untimely demise. Someone close to me also brushed hands with death this past week. This have had me pondering for a while now.
P.J. Jacobs from The Complete Fly Fisherman published an editorial of exactly what I was thinking. We should live every day like there might not be a tomorrow. The bucket list needs to get a priority and all the things I have put off for so long needs to be done. Everything on the list and everything that i might regret not doing needs to be put into action. This decision i made yesterday. Every day I need to look back on the day and be able to say that I have done something remarkable.
So today, after putting it off for months, went for a casting lesson. I have been fly fishing for 16 years and know... well to say the least, a lot. I have however, never been happy with my casting ability. Although I am quite able to cast out a full line, I have to put in way to much effort to make this happen from what I'm told by the experts, should not be the case.
Some time ago Tim Rolston, a well known fly angler and expert caster, offered me his book at no cost with one condition, I need to publish a review of said work. So today after having endless excuses for months, I wen't for my first lesson. It was interesting and very entertaining.
After the first three exercises I could notice a dramatic improvement in the loops I was casting. I know I'm still doing something seriously wrong since I was tired at the end of the session. I am however confident that in the next few days I will have figured out my error and be able to do as instructed in the book.
Interestingly enough and incidentally as Tom told me it would be, my wife who has not cast a fly in her life, aced the first three exercises and fair'd much better than I, much to my own frustration. Idiot me, off-course, tried to cram all the exercises into a single 1 hour session with disappointing results. My own fault off-course. So tomorrow i will start again from exercise 1 up to to maybe number 4. I've read the book like four times but have been an armchair traveler up to today. With my new resolve this will change.
We will see how it goes tomorrow. I have achieved my goal of achieving something significant for the day and now need to effort doing the latter again tomorrow.
More on Tim Rolston's book: "Learn to flycast in a weekend" God willing I can make the time. It will be a best effort affair.
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