I want to be honest about this: I did not think I would catch a fish. I came to the Lower Mountain Fork weekend because my friend Kristen said I'd like the women and I'd like the river, and she was right about the first part by Friday night. The river part, I wasn't sure about yet.
I had never held a fly rod before Saturday morning. MeChelle put a rod in my hand and had me false-casting on the lawn for twenty minutes before she let me near the water. The cast was the hard part. The fish, it turned out, was the easy part.
I tied the fly myself the night before. A pheasant tail. It was crooked and the head was fat and it caught a fish anyway.
Sunday afternoon, in the slow water below the spillway, I drifted the little nymph through a seam and felt a pull that was not the bottom. I raised the rod the way MeChelle showed me and the fish came up and rolled in the current and it was a rainbow, not a big one, maybe ten inches, and it was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen in my life.
I am writing this because a year ago I would have told you I wasn't the kind of person who did this. I am the kind of person who does this. If you are wondering whether you are, the answer is yes. Come to a weekend. Bring a sense of humor and a pair of socks you don't mind getting wet. The rest, we'll figure out together.
