Fly Fishing: Socialization For Asocial Individuals

Socialization is important for survival in most species that inhabit the planet. The worst torture for a human being is to be isolated from others, set on a deserted island or thrown in the hole in a prison. Nothing is more torturous than these predicaments. On the contrary, the fly fisherman does not find solitude a lonely state but an enrichment of his time! The time he spends alone enriches his experience and the conversations he may have later with his fellow fishermen. That’s right, his fellow fishermen, who may seem asocial during the fishing day (except for sharing platitudes over coffee along the river bank), at night become highly social with friends that were mostly ignored all day. How many times have you gone fishing with friends and only caught glimpses of them during the day, enjoying the solitude? How many times have you gone around them to fish up or down stream without so much as a grunt? At the conclusion of the day, the reverse takes place and you become social again.