To Our Fallen Brother

Although I have been away for a while and have a lot of fishing to report on I am going to put that aside for now. A couple of days ago I checked my facebook only to find a post that said that,  “one of our own had passed away.” After a couple of clicks I found out that it was my great blog buddy, Bryan Dale from the Rogue Outdoors. I can’t help but miss him as I write this and so I will now take some time to express some thoughts about our fly-fishing brother. 

In an age where people are taught to worry about self interests and making profits or promoting self, Bryan stood out as different. He seemed to do things because he cared for others around him, even if it meant going out of his way to do so. He was the kind of person that I trusted right off the bat. His e-mails and comments were filled with a genuine kindness which is rare now in days. This drew me to him. By looking at his facebook page I can tell this drew others to him as well. 

I don’t remember if I found his page or he found mine but I’m blessed to have known him. I always looked forward to his comments. He was encouraging and never withheld his angling experience from me. Not only was he helpful, but he was extremely generous. On a couple of occasions he sent me some great patterns of flies that he tied and when I tried to pay him, he refused. All he said in response was that “we as fly fishers need to support one another.” 

And thats the type of caring, generous, warm individual he was. Or at the very least thats what I learned about him from our correspondence. You see I never met Bryan in person. I never talked with him on the phone. I never wet a line with him. And even though all of that is true, I still was able to see all of this through our e-mails messages and blog comments. It takes a great man to stand out based only on online communications but that’s exactly what Bryan was; A Great man, a great outdoorsman. 

I never got to fish with Bryan. We talked quite a few times about fishing together in his neck of the woods or mine but unfortunately we didn’t get to do it. And although we only spoke of fishing together, his memory will now accompany me through my travels and he will be with me when I wet a line, go camping or hiking. Bryan’s memory will be with me as I explore the Rogue Outdoors. 

I finish this Post with some words from Norman Maclean and his timeless classic, A River Runs through it. 

“The river was cut by the world’s great floods and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs. 

I am haunted by waters.”