All Around Angler

With the exception of one lake in Oregon and another in Wyoming, both of which I grew up fishing on during the summers, I am not a lake fisherman. I have very little interest in fishing in the Ocean, either.

It’s real tough for me to get excited about guys that go on and on about lake trolling, salt angling for salmon or tuna fishing 50 miles off the shore. I guess you could say I’m a bit of a river snob. I believe that anglers who can occastionally master the angle on a free flowing river, no matter the method, is an angler I am more likely to relate to. I have been struggling on what type of content will get my readers/viewers excited lately.

Where are these thoughts coming from?

You see, running a niche blog like this one is akin to designing trendy clothing, automobiles, music…or anything else that can get someone up or wear someone out. The key to engaging people, virtually, may never be known except by a select few. And I certainly am not in that group. I just run a blog out of the sheer passion for angling that courses through my blood like water down a river bed.

So today, after successfully putting TeamSmolt to sleep in his cradle, I though I might draw a comparison for you that I seem to often drift back to in my mind. And that is that life, as we live it, is much like a river:

It winds and weaves unpredictably while offering opportunities at every bend.

It can carry you away to oblivion or bring you right back up to the shore from which you came.

A river can deliver food to you, quench your thirst or just put you to sleep as it laps against the banks of which it winds.

Rivers create paths that change almost every year. Sometimes much more often than that.

They require you get to learn them over and over much like life requires of each one of us.

Constant changes while unpredictable can be very soothing and reassuring as well. After all, life shouldn’t be so routine and predictable that it’s tough to keep your eyes open all day, right? Let life carry you where it may, like a river does it’s precious cargo afloat, but remember you can paddle to shore most of the time if you need to.

I am grateful for those of you who take a moment to read these thoughts today. The craft of word through my own expression is nearly as satisfying as standing on the banks of a river. A river called life.

I’d like to thank my dad for always taking me to the woods where rivers run and for telling me at a young age that the trees are my pews. I hang onto those trees along the river bank and smile every time I am out amongst.

Without Wax,

Christopher Raymond Heller
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