Once you’re lucky, twice you’ve got the ass kissing down to a science

There comes a time in a person’s life where they need to either shit or get off the pot. The original goal might have been altruistic – specifically, finding a cure for cancer, or non-specifically, creating world peace, but now re-evaluation becomes the order. You’ll likely flip the self-interest switch, focusing on reaching the summit of Mount Everest or redlining a Ferrari on the PCH – thrill you or kill you. But alas, you’re now sitting on the couch watching Discovery Channel, the Outdoor Network, or MotorWeek. That’s defined as failure. Time to let someone else use the commode.

When I was young, I too had a dream – it was to catch as many fish as possible before someone stuck me in a wooden box. At the time I didn’t think much about the path to achieving such a lofty goal – as I sat by this little pond down the street, taking in the mid-afternoon sun and picking off bream with a beat-up popper, I figured it would just come to me. Someday.

Decades later I’ve finally figured it out…to bag a lot of fish you have to smooch a lot of behind. Sounds crazy, but it’s true.

A passerby once inferred that I wasn’t a half-bad fly fisher. They were obviously steeped in heavy narcotics – I was certain it was all dumb luck. And when Andrew Bennett, head honcho for Deneki Outdoors, called me last April to ask if I would join a crew in South Andros for some bonefishing and blogging, my suspicions were [seemingly] confirmed.

For the past year I’ve been running around casting flies at anything that moved, and attributing the opportunities to a steady diet of four-leaved clovers and Feng shui. Then the phone rang [again], and my conclusion was submersed in turmoil. See, there’s going to be another FIBFest, and despite the stratospheric bar tab and brazen larceny at the poker table during the previous, I’ve been invited back.

I’m now chalking it up to skill, not in fly-fishing but in kissing that which crosses the threshold last. And I’m not going to apologize for it either.

MG signing off (to pucker up, and pack for The Bahamas)