Ashley and I have discovered we can submarine an entire summer by not intentionally spending time and money to get our crew out of town within a week of school getting out. If we don’t mental and emotional ruts begin to run deep in tandem with living room couch cushion indentations. (The YouTube phenomenon is real). This year we experienced a special dispensation of God’s goodness in the form of some good friends offering us a week at their time share in Park City, Utah. This is the kind of thing you just don’t pass up, so we didn’t. Of the 50, Utah was right up there with Rhode Island and New Mexico on the list of states I knew virtually nothing about. While there a native described it as a “black hole in the middle of the southwest”, meaning people just forget that it is there. I think its working in Utah’s favor, because when we got there, it felt largely undiscovered, and indescribably beautiful.
My middle son Bentley is rapidly becoming an avid outdoorsman. All the nuances of navigating the natural world in fishing and hunting suit themselves quite nicely to the nooks and crannies of his beautiful mind. I want to pour as much gas on this as is realistically possible because I know it will be good not only for his mind, but also for his soul. So, upon discovering that the Provo River is a “renowned blue ribbon trout fishery” I bit on hiring a fly-fishing guide for the two of us. Four hours for Bentley and me with a local expert immersed in trying to land the illusive Brown Trout. Worth it. Pro tip we discovered on the way: Fly fishing isn’t something you can just jump into. It’s a skill to home in on over time, and those that are in it are in it. In some ways it should be likened to golf. Technique is nuanced and price point entry level is high. Everything is expensive. I bought Bentley and I a Facebook marketplace rod and reel combo a few weeks before we got on the plane so we could practice in the backyard. Chuck Gersbeck, one of the elders at our church (and one of the kindest guys I know) spent a Sunday afternoon giving us a crash course on small loop casting so we didn’t look like complete hacks when we showed up. (Thanks Chuck, you saved our bacon!)
The afternoon of our excursion Bentley and I made the 30-minute drive from the altitude of Park City down passed the Jordanelle Reservoir into the Provo River Valley. The views of the still snow-capped Wasatch Mountain range to our west were stunning along the way. I couldn’t keep quiet about it. “Can you believe this place?” I said hoping to evoke a response from Bentley. He sat quietly soaking it all in like he was studying for a final exam. I now realize that he was trying to visualize the experience we were about to share, prepping himself as best he could having never done it. While I’ve seen some fallout from the level of self-imposed expectation that comes from him doing this, it’s one of the things I love about him. The way his wild imagination readily leads him into adventure. There’s quite alot happening behind those striking blue eyes.
We found our way to the floor of the valley where we were instructed to meet Kysen, our guide for the day. After a few minutes a mud brown Ford F-250 Extended Cab with a matching bed cap and roof rack stirred up the dust behind us. It pulled up adjacent to a large storage shed at the side of the gravel parking lot where we were parked. Kysen popped out of the driver’s seat with gusto wearing well worn, outdoorsman gear and polarized Pit-Viperish sunglasses. He was a younger man than me by at least ten years or so, lanky and lean pushing 6’ 4”. When I approached to shake his hand, I could instantly tell he was on the downslope of a morning marijuana meeting and smelled the part. My gut got a little tense as I looked at Bentley’s expectant eyes. My knee-jerk mental reaction gave way to the realization that I wasn’t completely familiar with the legalities of that sort of thing in this specific part of the country. Who knows…maybe some of Colorado had rubbed off on Utah due to sheer proximity? In either case, he didn’t seem to pose a threat, so I went with it wondering if Bentley was catching on. He’s certainly a perceptive one. Perhaps we would have something interesting to discuss on our way back up the mountain after our afternoon fishing.
In no time Kysen had the door to the storage shed popped open fitting us with waders and boots for the afternoon. “I like to wear mine loose,” he said. I did the same. After we were squared away, we hopped in our respective vehicles and made the short drive across highway 189 to the banks of the river. We pulled into a parking lot packed with other fishermen prepping for the afternoon. I noticed that Kysen saw them competitively. The fight for the best fishing hole seems as old as time. I wouldn’t be surprised if it came up in Cain’s argument with Abel (which didn’t end well). Kysen quickly grabbed his backpack and a handful of rods from the back of his truck and led the way through brush and puddle to a gentle bend in the Provo River with a gathering of rocks upstream that generated some diversity in the flow of the water. After setting up camp he pulled his fly box from his backpack and began rigging up the rods, prepping us for what was ahead while he worked. “We’re nymphing today gentlemen…”. I nodded my head confidently as to not let Bentley in on the fact that I had no idea what that meant. Behind us, the river’s water wasn’t even waist deep, but I was already over my head. Kysen, even in his current state, peeked up, looked at us through his polarized sunglasses and saw through my façade. He took it all in stride having done this a thousand times. He continued, “This is a bounce rig. We might get to dry flying today, but we’ve gotta see what they’re eating and what the water will give us.” Another hollow nod from me. He spent the next 30 minutes brilliantly presenting the fundamentals of the cast, the mend, the drift, and how to set the hook should a strike occur. Bentley and I were mesmerized. In what seemed like no time at all my son, and I were knee deep in the Provo proficiently casting upstream, watching our strike indicators tick along the rocks at the river’s bottom as Kysen’s custom balloon strike indicators drifted in perfect pace with the natural flow of the river. He was a master teacher. He oozed with knowledge and passion, dropping little nuggets of technique in our laps as he saw fit. He turned to Bentley, “Take a step forward and cast the exact same way.” He was right, that slightest move made all the difference in the world in the way the rig was presented to fish we were trying to catch below. He knew what bugs the trout were craving and how to emulate them, he knew how to gauge the depth of the water we were in and adjust our rigs accordingly. As a result, Bentley started landing them. I stood upstream about 20 yards or so and watched his rod bend as he lifted it up in the air to hold tension while Kysen netted the catch. Proud papa syndrome set in deep. I tried to snap as many pictures of his interchange with river, the fish, and the guide as I possibly could from my position without losing my iPhone in the current.
I soaked the experience in. Having never been fly fishing before, I found myself falling in love with the sense of full immersion that came with it. Knee deep in the flowing waters, the sound of its gentle lull drawing me into presentness with where I was, there at the bottom of a valley surrounded by snowcapped mountains. It was awe inspiring. But, in terms actually catching fish…for me it was awfully quiet. So much so that Kysen felt it, too. Out of what might have been a sense of obligation that came from the knowledge that I was footing the bill for his time; he moved upriver toward me and grabbed the pole from my hand to inspect the rig. “Might be the case of a cursed rod,” he said with a pensive smile. “This has got me doubting my bugs…let’s change it up.” Another hollow nod from me. His nimble fingers began to rework the rig at the end of my fly line. He pulled the two miniscule nymph bugs which had been so successful for Bentley. He then reached in his fly box and pulled out something that was relatively large, extremely fluffy, and bright yellow. To me it looked like one of those small children’s toys that they place by the check-out counters at toy retailers in attempt to soak a few more dollars out of you before you leave. Without taking his eyes off what his fingers were up to I heard Kysen grunt, “Big bug. They love the big bug.” With the rig now reworked he began to introduce the concept of top water fly fishing. “This is Brad Pitt stuff,” he said. Scenes of A River Runs Through It started to play in the back of my mind. Kysen pointed upstream to a large rock poking up through the surface of the river. “Look at that,” he said. “What do you see?” I was afraid answering would fully show the cards of my ignorance, as if he hadn’t already read them.
What happened next was truly remarkable. He began to describe in vivid detail the way he observed the water coming off the rock. In an area of about six square feet his trained eye recognized four movements in the water, each interrelated with the other yet with their own distinct flow. He read it like Dostoevsky, wrought with complex characters with names nearly impossible to pronounce. But he knew the novel’s masterful plotline like the back of his nimble hand. He began to describe how the trout would tend to behave in each distinct flow, and where they were most likely to be found. He then took the re-worked rod in hand and began to demonstrate the nuances of the dry cast, flinging the big yellow bug with amazing precision to capitalize on what he was reading in the river. His technique was flawless. “This is quick,” he said. “You can’t hang out too long in one place or they’ll get bored.” He shifted the position of his body, keeping himself in constant motion to keep his presentation of the bug fresh on the water’s surface in order to fool the fish. I stood back and watched the grace of his fly line move back and forth across the surface of the water placing the big yellow bug precisely where his eyes desired it to be, when he desired it to be there. He looked like Neo cracking the Matrix code. It was a beautiful convergence of knowledge and skill. Far beyond rule keeping. He was speaking a language. Moving way past where we had been, he was embodying the very spirit of the craft. After a few minutes of this master class, he turned and made his way back to where I stood watching him, placed the rod in my hand, and said, “Go ahead.” I was afraid to take it. I stood in the river, still as the rock, trying to process what had just happened. I waited until he turned his back to try. When I did, I realized how difficult what he had done was. There was so much wisdom and experience in his movement. It was the kind of thing that could only be born of deep passion and extreme proximity over long periods of time.
When all was said and done, I left the Provo valley without catching one brown trout. Bentley won the day 3-0. I was so happy for him. As we drove up the mountain back to Park City we didn’t talk about the way Kysen had smelled when he first shook my hand. Instead of Bentley silently visualizing what was about to happen, he was silently replaying what had happened. We had both been bitten by the fly-fishing bug and were so grateful for the shared experience. Now that some time has passed some thoughts have formed in my mind about my experience observing Kysen move into that new zone. As is often the case, I find myself discovering truths about Jesus through these kinds of experiences. This one brought my mind back to the late-night conversation between he and Nicodemus. It can be found in the well-known third chapter of John’s gospel. Nicodemus had prided himself in his ability to keep the rules. It’s how he earned his keep and justified himself before his community and, in his eyes, before God himself. That is, until he ended up in front of God himself. When that happened, a new reality was painted for him with masterful strokes. It was one full of life and color. As nuanced as flowing mountain water dancing around stones in a stream. It was no longer a case of self-justification through rule following. Jesus spoke of total rebirth. Of water, Spirit, and wind. He introduced a new language bringing new depth, purpose, and dimension to everything Nicodemus had previously known. Jesus was pulling him into a new and vibrant way of living in connection with the Living God which far surpassed the letter of the law that he had been so accustomed to. He was the very embodiment of the Spirit of God. Nicodemus must have stood on the flip side of that late night conversation with Jesus like I stood after Kysen had put the rod back in my hand, with awe of what I had just witnessed and a heart that burned to experience it myself. It must have felt foreign and out of his league, yet the invitation remained. “Go ahead.”
As I continue to live the Christian life, I am constantly pressured to minimize my relationship with the Living God to my ability to follow the rules in the place of embodying the Spirit. My prayer is that you and I would continue to be open to His invitation into what it means to read the nuances of the beautiful river in which we find ourselves. To see things the way He sees things and to learn to speak His new language. To operate in the Spirit. Who knows….we may even catch some fish.
*Special thanks to Greg and Deirdre for being a huge part of this story. We love you guys!
Share this post