We all know the openness and relief of launching a skiff or stepping in the shallows in our waders for a day of fishing. “Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty, I’m free at last.” Your professional and personal problems drift away into the smell and sound of the river, into the peopleless landscape that neutralizes the poison. The connections that Leeson speaks of come together by themselves in this state of grace. This metaphor of wholeness enacts itself because you are being drawn into the patterns and rhythms of the natural world. As Octavio Paz said, “Beyond ourselves,/on the frontier of being and becoming,/a life more alive claims us.”
On a more ordinary level, older fishing is gentler, far less aggressive and far less acquisitive. One day it was so gentle I fell asleep while rowing; sometimes a nap is needed. I’m not just there to willy-nilly jerk a fish out of the water. One day I got stuck trying to sleep on the floor wrapped around the seat in the bow of the boat.
Read the rest of Harrison's homework at MidCurrent.
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