Fishing for peace

I fish for peace. That sounds strange, doesn't it? Some fish for walleye, others for salmon, I pretend I am fishing for glistening trout, "the rise in the ring" as fly fishers call it, but my quarry is a lot more elusive than the explosive and brilliant trout of the Colorado high country. I fish for peace, peace for me, peace of mind-- the kind of peace that doesn't come in a pill or a bottle.

I wear my war on my face; look closely, that small scar below my eye is from a chip of volcanic rock. A seven year old threw it at me because we were ordered not to throw him food. The creases around my eyes and brows are not laugh lines; they are from squinting into an African sun.

I wear the war across my hands; the knuckles scarred by scrubbing against sandbags. The back of one hand is lit by a graceful silver scar that taught me the right way to handle concertina razor wire. The palm of my right hand bears the odd mark from a gouging by coral. The thin scars on my right hand, like tracery, bear witness to a booby-trapped cane.

I wear the war on my calves. Thick red rubbery lines mark the last surgery, less than two months ago, up both calves. The small burn marks, like little craters. The burn across the lower edge of a knee from a burning muffler. The series of marks from a centipede that burned across my leg when I slept. The gouge marks from falling into eroded coral. The thin dashes of slicing metal.

I walk the pose of indifference, calmly and with purpose. But the body is the geography of memory, an atlas of a world of one. I can leave events in the past but I take me where I go. And at nights there isn't anything between me and me, no buffer from the past then. There is just the map of where I have been and what I have done.

I pack my things up. A few rumpled shirts. Underwear. A pair of old jeans. A fleece jacket and gortex. Fishing shorts. A journal and pen and palm pilot. A cell phone that I can turn off and pretend the reception was bad. A couple of books I plan to read at night. A carton of cigarettes. I'll take a nice shirt and chinos in case I need to dress up and pretend I am a citizen in Vail.

In my fishing bag I pack three reels, my waders and boots. Five pairs of smart wool socks. A camera and extra batteries and film. My fishing vest with all the items that counterfeit me a fly fisherman. My Brodin net with it's silky whorls of walnut and straight grained cherry. I pack my three silky blue Thomas and Thomas rods because you don't know what the water will be like until you stand in it. Sometimes I take camping gear and sometimes my idea of camping involves a hotel.

I'll pack the car and head down 93, past Rocky Flats and take the back way, using highway 6, through six short tunnels, and head to Idaho Springs and I-70. Climb slowly up to Berthoud Pass and decide: Do I go to the Roaring Fork or the Western Slope? The destination used to be important to me, now it’s merely my excuse, how I justify the journey. The higher I climb the more I feel my life fall away from me.

I'll check in or pitch camp and head toward the water. Suit up and string up. Spend some time studying the water for a hatch, check under rocks for whatever they are feeding for, and maybe even seine the waters. Its like the Act of Contrition before you go for communion. I always start the same no matter what I find, for first and foremost fly-fishing is about the earthy pull of traditions.

Then I cast. My brain shuts up. I might not find peace at that moment but I do find silence. That's close enough.