That fat brown trout must have been king of its alpine pool for years.
Then I came along.
I recently returned from a two-week road trip with my boyfriend. From Colorado, we drove west, watching the country unfold from the cab of his truck: dusty, sage-speckled hills to towering red mesas to rippling coastal fir forests as vast as the sea itself.
Among these ever-changing landscapes – all new to me – I wanted to experience as much as possible. For starters, I wanted to learn to catch and clean a fish.
One hot, dry morning, we hiked into the Sierra Nevada Mountains, climbing beneath giant sequoias alongside the narrow Tule River, which cascaded down the rocky hillside in a series of waterfalls. Below each drop, we took turns casting the line.
My boyfriend caught a foot-long trout on his first throw, but I couldn’t get a bite. So we climbed to higher pools. Nothing. Again and again – nothing.
“Keep the rod at your side; cast against the current,” he instructed me.
Hopelessly, I tossed the line, again. And in a flash, that fat brown trout – longer and thicker than my forearm – darted straight for my shiny lure.
As I fought to reel it in, the pole twisting into a U-shape, I was surprised by the fish’s power. I was surprised by the feel of its rubbery flesh, the ease by which it parted against the blade of my knife, and by the warm, mucus-y feel of its guts.
Between the scent of death and ancient conifers, I was surprised how unchanged I felt by it all.
But I suppose that’s the thing about change. It begins subtly, like hills into mesas, seedlings into giants. Already, new life was springing forth, vying to fill the space created in that alpine pool.
View more of Abby Paffrath’s artwork
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