Life, like fishing, has no immediate evaluation, no immediate currency. We can be aware of minutes only if those minutes contrast with other minutes, or are too cold, too hot, too uncomfortable, or immensely surprising by how much joy or pain they represent. We revel in contrasts, in disappointments, in unexpected events. We revel in moments that turn out to be "memorable".
At our house, we still talk about the day our youngest caught his first fish in this lake. He had spent days with a pole in hand, waiting, casting and waiting, unraveling the line and casting again, and waiting. Re-setting the bait, casting and recasting, and pulling in weeds and debris. Fishing is addictive if at certain intervals, by some kind of unknown pattern, the fish bites and you can pull it up, and show it off to the audience around. It happened for Brian when he had no audience. We heard his yell of victory from the house and our response to his victory was not what he had anticipated.
We told him the fish was too small to keep.
He unhooked the fish, and dropped it back in the water. Later, when he returned home, he showed us the fish's real size. We had mis-interpreted. That was the last time Brian fished in this lake.
I have seen people attempt to fish all day long catching nothing. I have seen people spend two minutes and catch all the fish that they are allowed to catch. "Fish" stories about the big one that got away abound all over, at every waterhole. We tell the story of the fish that everyone thought was too little to become lunch.
