Find Some Quiet Awesome
For the past few weeks, I’ve been on a road trip with an Italian friend, and over the past weekend, we found ourselves on the coast of Oregon. In California, we’d had some luck foraging for coastal greens, Pismo clams, and mussels, and we wanted to keep trying. So we found a sporting goods store in Brookings, Oregon, to buy a fishing license. There, at a gun counter (try explaining that to a European), a good-natured, mustachioed clerk informed us that we wouldn’t need one: twice a year, Oregon has a “free fishing” weekend, where no license is required. The next day, we drove up a winding road following the Rogue River, which meandered out of the misty woods, grey and swollen. On the stony banks, I found a fisherman, who had a long rod, set with a large bell, propped up on the bank. When I told him I had no idea how to fish this kind of water, he jumped to the task of educating me. Here, he said, they were fishing for winter steelhead, massive rainbow trout that live part of their lives in the ocean. The fishing tackle included a heavy weight and a floating, spinning lure, which you cast out and let sit. I was in luck, the man said, because he had some extra tackle he would happily give me. He dug around in the back of the jeep and produced everything I would need to fish here (minus the rod and reel, which I actually have, stashed away in the camper van). The man drove off, and I set up the tackle as he’d shown me, and cast out into the river. I unfolded a camp chair and sat down, and for the next hour, I watched the water flow by. A red-headed merganser passed, riding the current, while a bald eagle circled overhead, much to the delight of my friend, who sat next to me with a pair of binoculars. Eventually two Canada geese arrived, landing on the river with what would have been grace if not for all the honking. No steelhead showed up, which is good, because I’m not a true angler, and the prospect of landing a 24-inch fish had me worried. Still, for that hour, I thought of nothing but the river. No news, no noise, no sense of impending doom — just the quietude of a world I’d almost forgotten. I snapped a picture and sent it to my dad, who is an avid fisherman. I included a brief note: “Fishing for winter steelhead on the Rouge River,” to which he replied, “That’s so awesome!” And it was. So here’s a note to say, don’t forget to find something awesome this weekend. The noisy world can wait.
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