Missing fish

Time is upon us in this utopia we call Charlotte Harbor. The silver kings have come home to make their nest for the next few months. The snook are headed to the beaches and the reds are still in the backwaters that we love all winter long. I am one of the few privileged anglers that get to call this home. Off the coast a mile or five the kingfish is shredding leaders and the cudas are smiling as they nibble them on their way to the boat. This is the dream that I have dreamed all of my life. From the time I was young child.

Yet I still fell empty inside. I miss the fish. I long for days of catching and catching with nothing but a smile on my face. When I was a child it always seemed so much easier, simpler and purer. I no longer have the same smile day after day. Even though the fish are bigger and fight harder, i still long for the day when it was simple.

I moved down to Florida from WV where I fished everything from slow lazy pools with bass, sunfish and catfish too the most beautiful trout streams east of the Mississippi. Never did I have to worry if there was enough line on the reel, actually I never worried about anything. 

Every now and then I get nostalgic and remember a simpler time when fishing made me smile. In every memory was my Dad. I just wish the old man could have seen the fish we are catching now. 

Love the ones you fish with, they will not be here forever. Teach someone to fish so they can pass that along.