Fly Fishing - Mother Nature's Headache Medicine

Every four years the nation is plunged into another presidential election. It consumes the media, the water cooler, and our minds. You can turn off the T.V. or radio, you can avoid certain personalities during the day, but you can't escape the ongoing debate in your head. Thank goodness for fishing. A visit to the stream is the perfect remedy for a mind frazzled from a week's worth of headlines. The sight of cottonwoods shedding their summer foliage, the scent of air infused with vanilla from the ponderosas, and the sound of water tumbling over stones scintillates the senses, reframing your outlook on life. The dull throb in the frontal lobe of your brain begins to ease as you focus on threading the eye of the hook and making sure the knot is secure. You check your line for abrasions, searching for any imperfection that could cost you the fight. You survey the surroundings looking for "fishy" water. And when you find that patch of water that looks promising, you let loose an arc of line that propels your fly back... and then forward dropping it within inches of your target. Perfection? No. Freedom? Yes.

Maybe you catch a trout. Maybe not. No worries, though. Your world view is again in balance.

At the end of the day, as you trudge back to the car, you know intellectualism is still under assault, the Religious Right is still wrong, and W is still in charge, but at least you have a few memories to savor that will get you through the daily grind until the next time you venture to the river's edge.