At the Platt River Campground, reading

short stories about fly fishing before

falling asleep, his eyes fell on a des-

cription of what the author termed

“the arrogant stage” – the stage of

“fish counting.”  Apparently, it’s not

just for sophomoric fly fishers who

brag and try to one-up one another. 

Upon returning from a fly fishing trip

to Colorado,  he was asked, “Did you

catch any?” or “How many did you

catch?” or assuming he had some luck,

“How big were they?”  Just pleasant

inquiries? Maybe. Maybe not. Seems

like numbers and size are what count. 

So, like the author’s wise fishing buddy,

he went along with the game and said,

“Sure.  Many, many, many, really, really,

really big ones,”  with a smile on his face.

The author’s buddy said “Sixty-five good

size ones in just a couple of hours. How

about you?” People just lowered their

brows and said, “That’s nice,” turned and

went quietly into their houses. For what

were they fishing? Maybe not so many

fish and not so big, so they could say,

“Oh, that’s too bad. Better luck next time,”

and go into their houses, with a smile

on their faces as they close the door

behind them. Actually, the man said

“Four little browns.”  And then felt

obliged to explain that he was fishing

on a small creek where very smart little

fish live. And that seemed to make

the sophomores feel pretty good.

Or perhaps even better, “No, didn’t

catch a single fish.”  “Ah, too bad.

Got skunked, huh?” Then again,

perhaps they were just being

neighborly and the man was being

sophomoric.