“Next to prayer, fishing is the most personal relationship of man.”

Herbert Hoover

Angling is always in season for me. In all seasons, I fish or think fish; each season makes its unique contribution, and there is no season of the year when I am not angling.

Nick Lyons, Winter Dreams

“For the supreme test of a fisherman is not how many fish he has caught, not even how he has caught them, but what he has caught when he has caught no fish.”

John H. Bradley

“I imagine that no art has ever been learned from books. Fly-fishing is no exception.”

G.E.M. Skues

I fish because I like to, because I love the environs where trout are found, which are invariably beautiful; and hid from environs where crowds of people are found, which are invariably ugly. Because of all the television commercials, cocktail parties and assorted social posturing I thus escape, and because in a world where most men seem to spend their lives doing things they hate, my fishing is at once an endless source of delight and an act of small rebellion. Trout do not lie or cheat or cannot be bought or bribed or impressed by power, but respond only to quietism and humility and endless patience. I fish because I suspect that men are going along this way for the last time, and I, for one, do not want to waste the trip, because only in the woods can I find solitude without loneliness. And finally, I fish not because I regard fishing as being terribly important, but because I suspect that so many of the other concerns of men are equally unimportant, and not nearly so much fun.

John Voelker, Supreme Court Judge (aka Robert Travers)
Anatomy of a Fisherman

A friend recently shared the following little story with me, and I was stuck by the simple wisdom it conveys. Hope you will be, as well.

A business man was at the pier of a Mexican coastal village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked. Inside the boat were several large yellowfin tuna. The business man commented on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took to catch them. The fisherman replied “only a little while.” The business man then asked why didn’t he stay out longer and catch more fish? (more…)