Why do you love fly fishing?

Sometimes I wonder, how did I get here?  No, this is not some sort of existential question about why I am here or my place in the universe.  I mean, how did I become a guy that loves fishing as much as I do?  Surely that creeps into the mind of a fisherman when he is standing in waste deep water, half freezing and not catching a darn thing.  Why do we subject ourselves to making a difficult thing (catching a fish) even more difficult (fly fishing).  I have mentioned before that I regularly meet with a group of teenagers in an effort to show them how to cast, tie flies, and catch fish.  Inherently, I will be asked a question at least once a year that usually sounds like, "Do you catch more fish with a fly or live bait."  I try not to laugh out loud at this query, but my response always starts out, "With bait, but fly fishing is a lot more fun!"  So again, why do we do what we do?  In the immortal words of Hank Williams, Jr., "Views?  Yeah, I've got some."

My fist thought is that fly fishermen must love challenges.  From learning knots, to casting, to even deciding on a type of strike indicator, almost everything has more obstacles to overcome than "regular fishing" as my students like to call it.  Heck, most of time sitting in a boat isn't even an option.  Heavens no, we have to put on oversized overalls to keep us dry (sometimes) and actually get in freezing water and fight against the current to get another 3 feet on a cast to a spot that might or might not hold a fish.  On top of that, you have to read different types of current at different parts of the stream and cast in such a way that your fly goes where you want and actually does what a living thing would actually do!  Challenging?  You better believe it!

Maybe it's the scenery.  I've fished a lot of places before and every single one of them had their pretty parts.  I've even fished near downtown Kansas City in neighborhoods that were run-down, but even then there were pretty pieces of water.  John Voelker wrote the following in his poem "Testify":

"I fish because I love to; because I love the environs that trout are found, which are invariably beautiful, and hate the 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..."

Yep, that pretty much sums it up right there.  Thank you Mr. Voelker!  Also, you can check out the entire visual poem below.

Maybe we fish because of the drama.  I have to think that even William Shakespeare would find the beauty in fishing because there is no way to predict what is about to happen when you are on the water.  There is no telling what will happen with the weather, when your next bite will come, or maybe there won't be a next bite.  Millions of people watch sports because of the unknown and the story-line that is so unpredictable because the players write the script as they proceed through the game.  I would venture to say that fishing is even less predictable because the story contains wild animals, weather, and scenery that is even less predictable than human behavior.  Just think, every single thing that you experience on the water are all a result of you being in that exact place at that exact time.  If you would have been home on the couch watching reruns of The Big Bang Theory or Seinfeld, you would have missed out on whatever you experienced.

There are some that fly fish to escape from the daily grind.  I think a primary difference between fly fishermen and bait fishermen is that a bait fisherman can let his mind wander for a large amount of time while a fly fisherman engages parts of his brain that have nothing to do with his daily routine.  I'm not saying one is right and the other is wrong, it is merely a personality difference.  I will still drift Powerbait on Lake Taneycomo if you give me the chance, but I would prefer to drift nymphs in the trophy area.

Fly fishermen have to be, at least be in part, thrill seekers.  Why else would be wade rivers, climb on belly boats, and make difficult casts between willows if there wasn't some possibility for some incredible reward?  For fly fishermen, there is a risk-reward factor that is always present and the greater the risk promotes the idea of the bigger reward.  Just think of the excitement that you get when you are about to set the hook on a fish that you know has inhaled your fly or when you feel a fish tug on the other line.  Just typing that got my blood pumping and heart rate up.  We've all seen Brad Pitt take a ride on the Big Blackfoot and thought to ourselves, "That's awesome!  I want to do that!"  If you guaranteed me a trout as big as the one he landed, I might risk life and limb too.

There is always the chance that the reason we fly fish is all of these reasons or none of these reasons.  Maybe we do it for the same reason that the first Native American brave sneaked away from his tribe to catch fish and let them go.  Maybe we are just curious.  Maybe we just want to connect with nature.  Maybe we want to hold a life in our hands and give life back to something.  Or maybe John Voelker said it best in his poem,

"and, finally, not because I regard fishing as being so terribly important but because I suspect that so many of the other concerns of men are equally unimportant - and not nearly so much fun."