Coach Potter
Life of the Party
My boy's and I have logged 1000's of hours on the water together but I had transitioned from fly fishing to bass fishing right after they were born. As a result, they didn't grow up fly fishing like I did. When we moved to N. Idaho last summer, I decided to get back into the fly fishing game. My oldest went off to school in Helena. A few of his teammates are guides in the summer and they sparked his interest...the timing was perfect to get us back fishing together again. This is what I have learned in our first few trips.
1- As dumb as it sounds, I forgot how much I missed fishing with him. That's not something I would have thought I would forget but I had.
2-He brings a fresh and refreshing perspective to something that I started doing when I was much younger than he is now. We have some things about our personalities that are hard wired identical but he thinks about some things in a completely different way than I do. I am the definition of type A...he is not. Yesterday was a slow day on the water. All of my attention was100% focused on solving the fishing puzzle. His attention was focused on taking in all of the surroundings of a new environment. He had never waded a river in wader's...he said it felt like cold compression therapy. He just couldn't get over how cool that felt to him.
3-He LOVES to explore. He wanted to go up every side channel we came to. I didn't think they would hold the kind of fish I wanted to catch fish but he thought they looked cool. I ended up catching my best fish of the day in one of those side channels and we walked up on small herd of elk...being in and around elk is always awesome!
4-I have some letting go to do. I rarely worry about the safety of my boy's, I never have. We are a football family, participating in that and worrying about physical safety doesn't reconcile. Yesterday, I was about tom make a crossing that I told him I didn't want him to do. He reminded me that he's a 19 year old collegiate running back and I'm a 47 year old dude with a fake hip. Fair enough, so we talked about how to do it and then did it together.
5-He is WAY more creative than I am. I can see him trying different things that could lead to better results than me.
6- Driving home he said, "I don't think a trout eating a stone fly is as exciting as a LM blowing up on a frog but the places trout live are so much more awesome than the places bass live."
1- As dumb as it sounds, I forgot how much I missed fishing with him. That's not something I would have thought I would forget but I had.
2-He brings a fresh and refreshing perspective to something that I started doing when I was much younger than he is now. We have some things about our personalities that are hard wired identical but he thinks about some things in a completely different way than I do. I am the definition of type A...he is not. Yesterday was a slow day on the water. All of my attention was100% focused on solving the fishing puzzle. His attention was focused on taking in all of the surroundings of a new environment. He had never waded a river in wader's...he said it felt like cold compression therapy. He just couldn't get over how cool that felt to him.
3-He LOVES to explore. He wanted to go up every side channel we came to. I didn't think they would hold the kind of fish I wanted to catch fish but he thought they looked cool. I ended up catching my best fish of the day in one of those side channels and we walked up on small herd of elk...being in and around elk is always awesome!
4-I have some letting go to do. I rarely worry about the safety of my boy's, I never have. We are a football family, participating in that and worrying about physical safety doesn't reconcile. Yesterday, I was about tom make a crossing that I told him I didn't want him to do. He reminded me that he's a 19 year old collegiate running back and I'm a 47 year old dude with a fake hip. Fair enough, so we talked about how to do it and then did it together.
5-He is WAY more creative than I am. I can see him trying different things that could lead to better results than me.
6- Driving home he said, "I don't think a trout eating a stone fly is as exciting as a LM blowing up on a frog but the places trout live are so much more awesome than the places bass live."