My Favorite Honey-Do

How is it that the honey-do list can be such a colossal pain? You’d think that doing things for the one you love would be a true joy and privilege. But it seldom works out that way. Most often the next item added to my honey-do list is the last thing I want to do or is something I think is completely unnecessary. But that is the point of a honey-do list, isn’t it? It’s a matter of perspective. The honey-do list looks at the world from my wife’s perspective, not mine. And because I love her, I do the list in spite of my own way of thinking.

Well, recently my wife added an item to my honey-do list that completely surprised and delighted me.

“Dear,” she said sweetly in her here comes another honey-do list item voice, “would you please take your grandson fishing.”

“What?” was my clever response.

“Your grandson needs to go fishing for his 4-H project and his dad is too busy at the moment to take him.”

“Oh,” was my sophisticated repartee. But I was stunned. Here was a honey-do list item that I really wanted to do. Words escaped me.

Preparations began immediately. The assignment required another nomadic venture. This time it was a day-long trip from North Idaho to Sheridan Wyoming, one of the fly-fishing capitals of the world. And as an amazing coincidence, I had been assigned the task of taking my grandson fly-fishing. That was his 4-H project, Fly Fishing. I couldn’t imagine how far 4-H had come. In my day 4-H projects were things like raising cattle to feed the world or raising sheep to clothe the world. I guess they still do those things today . . . lucky for the world. But now they have expanded into ever more practical projects like Fly Fishing . . . lucky for me.

The first thing I did, when I arrived in Sheridan, was to examine my grandson’s collection of fly-fishing gear. His father had done a great job of guiding and helping him to assemble the basics he would need. He had a splendid graphite pole with a matching line in a lovely case. There was a beautiful set of chest wading socks with corresponding wading boots. A clever over-the-shoulder pack for his gear held one empty fly box. My grandson had selected a fishing net that was nearly as big as he was. This was characteristic of my grandson’s cautious nature expressed as a desire to never let one of those precious fish get away. It was an interesting choice, but I decided that it could double as a wading stick which was a real boon in wading the treacherous waters that I was determined not to let him near. All he needed was a couple of flies and the whole wonderful world of fly fishing would open to him.

All-in-all my grandson’s kit way outclassed my old stuff. But it lacked the years of experience that were wrapped up in that ancient fiberglass rod and Roybi reel. I suddenly realized that I had been about my grandson’s age when I first began to proffer bits of fur and feathers tied on a nasty hook to gullible fish in our creek in Idaho. I had to borrow my grandson’s fishnet to help brace me against the wave of nostalgia that washed over me at that moment. I knew what he had to look forward to and I was determined to get him started properly.

The first and most important piece of equipment that my grandson lacked was a copy of The Curtis Creek Manifesto: A Fully Illustrated Guide to the Strategy, Finesse, Tactics, and Paraphernalia of Fly Fishing. I ordered a copy to be delivered to his doorstep from Amazon. Of course, it was not due to arrive until our final day of fishing so I had to loan him mine for our time together.

The Curtis Creek Manifesto can best be described as a comic book about fly fishing. It is also perhaps the most helpful and authoritative source of information for a young (or old) person learning the art. My grandson ate it up, from the Eleven Commandments to the final question, “Is there really a Curtis Creek?” It was a seriously sentimental moment to see him pouring over those old familiar pages just as I did when I was getting started. He loved the English Spitfire airplane mixed in with the illustrations of favorite insects that fish choose for food just like I had.

An uninvited guest, Mr. Murphy, decided to come along on my mission to Sheridan. High water is not a friend to fly fishermen. The week I took my grandson out fly fishing, high water barely even described the situation. We wondered at the signs on the way to our fishing spots proclaiming Yellowstone’s closure, only to learn later that the torrent which was interfering with a proper introduction to fly fishing had actually washed out many roads and bridges around the National Park.

We tried a number of ponds and lakes that I knew in the area but evidently, all the fish were fat and happy on the abundant food washed in with the record runoff. The still water was safer for my diminutive fishing partner, but totally unproductive. Finally, I remembered a place high in the Big Horn mountains where an outlet from a dam produced a more reasonable depth and flow. Leaving Mr. Murphy in Ranchester we headed up the mountain. All decked out in full fly fishing glory, my grandson and I waded into the spot I thought might give us a chance to snag a wily trout. I took the first cast, just to demonstrate, and bam, an 11-inch rainbow hit it full on. With my grandson managing the net we safely got that one in the creel.

Any number of fishing aficionados, including The Curtis Creek Manifesto, are eager advocates of catch and release. I was raised to believe that fish are for eating and I wanted to pass on that perspective to the next generation. I make it a point to only take as many fish as I can eat in a single meal, factoring in other people eating with me. I know that for really good fishermen, having to stop at a meal-size mess, would greatly shorten their outings. It’s never been a problem for me, so maybe being a mediocre fisherman works out pretty well sometimes.

With our first fish on the way to the dinner table, we waded back out into the stream. I positioned my grandson directly in front of me and got his hand holding my rod to get a feel for the cast and strike. It was a textbook case. The next cast produced another 11-inch rainbow which we hooked together and, with him managing the net, we soon had it keeping our first fish company.

Back out into the stream, we cast in tandem again. This time it took three attempts to get the fly into the right spot. But the strike was majestic and the fish thoroughly hooked. I turned the rod over to my grandson to play in the third lovely rainbow. I blundered around with the net but managed to get it around the final member of our upcoming feast. We stopped at three because I suddenly noticed that my grandson’s shivering was not entirely due to excitement, but was caused by the snowfall that was increasingly enveloping us. My guess is that we could have produced quite a large fish fry if we’d stayed longer, but as we reasoned: one for my grandson, one for me, and one to share with the poor saps who would never know this bliss was plenty.

As we walked away from that fruitful stretch of water my grandson looked wistfully back and said, “That’s our Curtis Creek, isn’t it Grandpa?”

I couldn’t agree more. Thanks my love, for that delightful Honey-Do. I’ll get the rest of the list done . . . someday.