fcch,
That video is just so wrong, and it's message just so right, in so many ways I can't even tell you.
It raised the hair on the back of my neck and I absolutely cringed through the whole thing, watching through my separated fingers as my hands covered my face.
I personally have had my own fly hit me on my glasses. This occurred when a strong gust of wind came up from my casting side during a back cast, and blew the fly right into my face.
I have also been hit by other anglers where the wind has changed the direction of their flies, or they were simply not paying attention.
I will share a story that literally wrenched my heart as I prepared to write this.
Many of you may have read the resulting article in one of our well known Fly Magazines. The article was written about Medical Emergency Air Transportation Insurance, which is available for purchase when traveling to foreign destinations out of the United States.
I have a friend that owns a fly fishing lodge in southern Mexico, and during a photo shoot for a magazine article, the photographer was shooting him casting off the beach to busting Roosterfish. Again the wind played a nasty roll in this and changed the trajectory of the fly, the fly hit and slid along the telephoto lens and across the top of the camera body and lodged in the photographer?s eye.
This was not a size 16 or 18 pheasant tail nymph either, how about a very, very large barbed stainless steel saltwater hook!
This started a week of absolute hell for both of these two men. The doctors in that part of Mexico were ill prepared for such an extreme eye injury.
They did the best they could to try and stabilize and save his eye, until he could be flown to a bigger city in Mexico for further medical attention, and finally back to the states where he went through a bunch more surgeries to save his eye.
The hook remained in his eye for several days before it could finally be safely removed.
Can you even imagine the shear gut wrenching hell this must have been to have a foreign object of that size imbedded in your eye and it can't be removed for several days!!! Oh, Hell No!!! Heeeeellllll Nooooooo!!!!!!!!
I never, ever, ever, want to walk not even "ONE DAY" in these men's shoes, Period!!!
Thank God, the doctors were ultimately able to save the photographers eye. He has since regained only partial vision, and last I heard probably will never fully regain 100% use of that eye.
I can only tell you that it haunts my friend to this day, this is something you never forget. I know both of these men have been left traumatized for the rest of their lives due to this tragedy.
So please, please, please people do yourself, your friends, and your family a favor and be responsible, wear glasses to protect your eyes and make sure they do too.
I always have a spare pair of glasses with me in my gear bag just in case I break mine, or a friend forgets his or hers. I carry glasses with different colored lenses so I have "NO EXCUSE" for not wearing them because it's to dark, or to bright out.
I believe that glasses are certainly one of the most important pieces of fly fishing gear I own, and I make use of them every time I go fishing.
I'm not willing to risk losing my eye sight for the cost of a pair of glasses, and I certainly don't want anything to do with some surgeon digging around in my eye to remove a hook.
I can't say for sure, but that venture might just ruin the whole fly fishing experience for me, forever!
Terry
"The solution to any problem - work, love, money, whatever - is to go fishing, and the worse the problem, the longer the trip should be." - John Gierach
Reply With Quote
