Fishing still figures

Among the things my father taught me fly fishing still figures prominently.

I don’t know where he picked it up. Fly fishing certainly wasn’t common in the rural Illinois of his youth, but it be-came Dad’s favorite way to fish.

He showed me how to cast foam rubber spiders for bass and bluegill when I was a kid and I’ve fished with a fly rod ever since.

Dad was a salesman with a route across southern In-diana and he always kept a rod in the trunk of his car, regularly stopping on his lunch break at a farm pond or stripper pit to make a few casts.

I thought that was the best part of my...