daydreaming on the couch.

This journal of my weight loss would probably pretty boring if that's I all I ever wrote about, then again maybe its just boring no matter what I say. 

On this bitter cold Pittsburgh day I am sitting on the couch watching a movie but my mind is drifting off to places I would rather be.  BoraBora on my honeymoon with my wife, in Firenze in Tuscany eating pasta and farm fresh veggies, on a stream or river fly fishing. 

The amazing thing about being alone on a stream fly fishing is that its not really about the fish.  Don't get me wrong, hooking into a beautiful trout will really get your heart pounding and the adrenaline flowing.  The reason I go out to the streams is for my own sanity.  There is no feeling like wading out into the cool 50 degree water a hint of sunshine glinting off the water as it snakes its way through the branches of the trees.  The air has a freshness that you can't describe, and the sound of the breeze rustling through the leaves brings an amazing feeling of peace.  The stream is an ever changing active animal.  Constant bubbling and gurgling, splashing and crashing.  You reach down into the water and pick up a small rock from the water and flip it over, only to find it teeming with small insects and larvae.  You find a nymph that looks like something you have in your fly box.  You take the imitation out of the box and tie it on to the line.  Looking across the stream from you is a large rock and a perfect seam of water that draws your stare.  You strip off a small amount of line, and cast back, forth, back, forth...launch...The line gently rolls out in front of you and sets the fly into the water.  You mend the line upstream to get that nymph to sink a little faster.  You pause, wait, and let the line silently and slowly work its way downstream.  Watching and waiting for the signs of an interested trout.  The line reaches the end of its drift, you lift the tip of the rod and roll cast back upstream to the same spot as before.  The line lazily drifts back down stream bouncing and sliding off the rocks smoothed by thousands of years of erosion in the stream bed.  You keep repeating the same sequence, occasionally changing the location of the cast to make sure you cover as much of the water as possible.  Then on what seemed like the worst cast of the morning you notice a strange pause in your line as it drifts downstream.  Could this be what you have been waiting for?  You quickly lift the tip of the rod and feel the weight and pressure of the  streamlined predator at the end of your line.  You quickly place tension on the line, and begin to guide the silver missile through the water toward you at the edge of the stream.  Your heart pounds and you can't wipe the smile off your face.  You feel like a child quietly giggling to yourself.  You net the Rainbow Trout gently remove the hook and release him back into the water.  You check the fly and pause for a moment looking up into the lightly clouded sky and everything is right in the world.