Inaugural Post: Lost Flies and Found Stories

I’ve lost more flies than I care to count. The trees take their share. Rocks, too. Some get shaken loose in the fight, others are just gone before I even know what happened. A bad knot. A bad choice. That’s the way she goes, until you learn better. Though the ones that disappear from something else—those are the ones that stick.

A lake striper will do it. The landlocked ones aren’t supposed to be any different, but they fight like they’ve got something to prove, like they remember that their kind runs through open ocean. They pull hard, relentlessly, deep. The first time I hooked one, I was probably too confident. It was a bigger fish, I wasn’t ready, and it let me know. The leader snapped with a sound I felt in my teeth. The fish was gone, but these moments leave an impression.

The smallmouth in the Ozark rivers are a different kind of fighter. It’s not about their grace, but rather staying tethered to a stubborn mule that wants to kick your ass all the way home. You don’t always see them eat, but you feel it. And if your attention has wandered, if you’re looking at a kingfisher, or wondering how illegally your truck is parked, you might lose your rod. The old-growth natives are to be respected.

Then there’s the tailwater trout, the ones that don’t want to look at a fly unless it’s the right size, the right shade, swimming at the right speed, with the right amount of indifference. They punish a bad drift, a bad strip, a bad angler, and make you work for a second chance. But when it works, you sometimes wonder why you ever fish for anything else.

This is just our backyard fishing here in the Ozarks. There are many, many more waters to explore. I do it because it’s what I know how to do. It’s a pursuit where the rules make more sense and time seems to move more slowly. There’s a rhythm to it, a cycle—Lost flies and found stories.

That’s what this is—a place to keep track of it all. The successful days, the unsuccessful, the ones that don’t seem worth remembering, but will come back to me later, in one way or another. Remembering makes one better.

This will turn into what it’s meant to—days on the water, more lost flies, fish caught, and memories that come from both. Either way, I’ll keep fishing, and I’ll keep writing. If that sounds like something you’re into, then welcome.

Thank you for reading.

-Braden