I have been writing this column, in one form or another, for more than 40 years. I’ve written under the banner of The Great Outdoors in the Salmon Arm Observer/Shuswap Market News for some 18 years now (it would be interesting to know just how many columns I have written). Truth be told, it has not always been easy coming up with new ideas.
I have, upon occasion, well – sort of had to stretch the truth – embellish the facts as it were. It is called creative licence.
Sometimes I end up describing, in great detail, a lake or a stream that exists only in my imagination.
Nevertheless, they are still very real trout that are caught in my imaginary lake or stream. The shadows lurking in the deep, dark holding pools are as real as the silver flashes that dart through the shallows to take my presentation, and take off to tail-dance across the surface of the water.
The trees that cast their palette of colours around my imaginary lake are the very same trees that once cast their olive green, shimmering forms across the waters of some lake that I have fished in the past.
All I have to do is shut my eyes and once again I can see that lake so vividly. It’s not hard to describe it in one of my stories. The osprey that I write about, soaring in the sky high above, is the same one I watched from my boat when I was out on the real lake, casting to real fish.
In my mind, there exist many lakes both real and imaginary. The dragonflies that buzz in and out among the reeds of the lakes I write about do so, in a similar fashion, on the many lakes that I have fished over the years. The trees that formed a canopy above the streams I fished as a kid, still tower above those streams when I lean back to look up at the sun in my mind’s eye. Just as the rays of the sun streaking through the branches of those trees still warm my body and my soul.
The caw of the magpie that mocks me as I stand, with fingers numbed on the banks of an imaginary river, casting to winter steelhead, sounds much the same as the one that mocked me from the high branch of a moss-covered cedar the very first time I went steelheading more than 50 years ago with my grandfather. And, while I know it is cannot be the same magpie, it is surely some distant relative. That voice is the same.
That moment, when a trout rises out of the depths to investigate my fly sitting on the surface of the water, gets my heart pounding each and every time I relive the experience.
The sight of sulphur mayfly wings quivering in the early morning sun lingers warmly in my mind.
The rustling sound of autumn leaves, disturbed only by a gentle breeze dancing across the tops of the trees, continues to rustle around in my memory, long after the breeze has passed.
Sometimes I get to go fishing for real in lakes and streams. Sometimes I merely write about fishing.
As you read this column, I will be sturgeon fishing on the Fraser River with my friend Corey. He is as ardent an angler as I have ever known. Corey and I have made a point of fishing together, at least once a year, for as long as I have been writing The Great Outdoors.
If nothing else, he keeps me honest.
I may use creative licence every now and then, but not when it comes to things like the number or size of fish. Details like that are unimportant. It’s being out on the water that counts. And when it comes right down to it, there’s no place I’d rather be.
