Sunday, April 18, 2010

A Pirate Gets it Right



Early last week I spent a pleasant evening catching up on some back episodes of Pirates of the Flats. If you are not aware of the show, it was an ESPN series that brought together a group of "fishing luminaries" to chase bonefish in the Caribbean and to examine the efforts to address the fish's dwindling numbers. The group included fly fishing's treasure, Lefty Kreh, Patagonia's Yvon Chouinard, comedian Michael Keaton, author Thomas McGuane and photographer R. Valentine Atkinson. Also in the group, and narrating the series, was Tom Brokaw, who's voice I could listen to forever. Plucked from an episode, these Brokaw words resonated with me:

"It was so vivid and it was so beautiful and the water was constantly changing character that I was transfixed by it. I spent today, six hours, wading through knee deep water, never got a hookup, and toward the end of the day I thought, you know, I can’t explain it to my friends, or to my family, about why it has been a perfectly good day for me. I really enjoyed it a lot. I’ve been in good company, I’ve had a good time, and I haven’t caught a fish. It wasn’t maddening. It wasn’t even frustrating. It was time well spent."

It couldn't have been said any better.

1 comment:

Lupo said...

Thanks for capturing and sharing. I'd like to give that a try down there myself for a week to make sure I completely agree but I suspect I'd feel the same, ha!