Some say…

Some say I communicate with the dead, that I have a special connection with beings no longer living, especially their recently departed friends and relatives.

I never want to take away hope from people for whom maintaining a relationship with those they love most dearly gives them a reason to carry on.

However, I’ve never held or professed the belief that I communicate with the dead, much less the living.

Instead I see things the way they are.

Yesterday, over the dark, churning waters below the Estes Lake Dam, I tossed a two-pound test fishing line with a fly fishing lure the size of the end of my pinky finger, bouncing the lure on the surface of the water and occasionally letting it sink down.

Large trout, from one to two pounds, swam up curiously, looked at the lure, and swam away.

Long have the waters of the Upper Rocky Mountains flowed through the Estes Park valley.

But fish of the type I teased with my lure have not always lived here.

As I dragged the lure through the water, I noticed something much bigger swimming in the depths.

Perhaps it was a juvenile specimen of monster fish that swim in the depths above the dam.

I looked at my watch.

Friday, the 13th of September 2019, 8:02:17 a.m.

Do I believe in signs or symbols?

Not really.

But I accept that when popular imagery coincides with events in my life, I’m willing to share what happened and let others decide whether more than dark clouds on the horizon predict stormy weather.

I bounced the lure on the water a few dozen times to pique the curiosity of fish circling about.

A large object moved upstream several feet below the water’s surface.

A fly fishing guide worked with two customers several hundred meters downstream.

They seemed to catch nothing.

My brother in-law worked the waters at a bridge farther away, getting not even a nibble on his lure.

Suddenly, the fish I had been seeing, approximate 12-16 inches long, brown or hybrid rainbow trout, cleared out of the way.

The large object rose up from the depths like a submarine, its colour changing from light brown to light green to white with green-and-brown spots.

I looked downstream.

My fellow fishermen didn’t seem to notice, kept trying to catch fish, the guide pretending that his customers weren’t casting properly.

I knew better.

As the object rose, my thoughts were prepared to see an albino fish which can sometimes survive in the least likeliest places.

I wish I could tell you what I saw was a fish.

I don’t believe in the supernatural.

I let my lure sink down to the level of the object, which moved toward the lure out of mild curiosity.

A long fin extended from the object’s body and grasped the lure, holding the lure up to its face, twisting it around, trying to figure out what I was offering.

I’ve always known I’ve been more than a mere fisherman.

Whilst fishing in the past, I’ve watched cardinals fly up to me and sit on my extended fishing arm like landing on the limb of a tree.

Mosquitoes love my flesh and I’ve rarely sprayed my exposed body parts with repellant. I’m willing to share my life’s essence, my blood, with creatures who were born to live on the body liquid of others.

The large object in the water pulled down on the lure, jerking it strongly twice, as if to tell me a message.

I dared not pull up.

Twice more, the object let go of the lure, grabbed it again and gave it two tugs.

By then, a circle of trout had formed around the object.

I was numb with disbelief.

I looked around me and no person was close enough to share this moment with me.

The large object rolled over, exposing its underside, as if to tell me it trusted me.

Normally, I record all around me, able to describe in minute detail the objects I see, often able to give the Latin biological name for objects such as Acer rubrum for red maple, citing its unique characteristics.

The large object in the water below me defied description.

It was not just a fish but its body covering was scalelike. However, I can’t tell you if the scalelike appearance was really just short white shiny hairs pressed against the object’s body.

The object’s body was wider than most fish one would expect to see around Estes Park.

All of the object’s fins were elongated and jointed.

Its headlike protrusion swiveled only slightly more than fish in the area.

There was nothing anthropomorphic about the object — pulling down on a fish lure had no translatable message — how many times had I seen birds tap on the side of a tree and imagined them sending Morse code, knowing better?

The object rolled back over and sank out of sight.

I bobbed the lure in the water a few more times and only captured the attention of a trout or two.

Downstream, one of the fly fishing customers caught a small trout which the guide pulled in with a net, gently unhooked it and placed it back in the water.

My brother in-law looked in my direction as if to say it was time to go.

I didn’t want to leave the waters below the dam.

At the same time, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to see if the large object in the water had other plans for me and would spoil my disbelief in the supernatural.

Reluctantly, I coiled up my fishing line and took my brother in-law back to the cabin where my wife and sister in-law were cooking us breakfast, sans trout.

Strange things happen that usually have a logical explanation. Given enough time and scientific observation I would be able to solve the mystery of the object I thought I saw in the water.

I wouldn’t have told you this story except for the following.

Often, the small double bed my wife and I have shared in the cabin above Estes Park gets hot in the wee hours of the morning.

In those cases, I have gotten up and walked to another room with bunk beds to cool off before returning to curl up with my wife and sleep until dawn.

Outside the window of the bunk bed room are some variegated vines of Vinca major growing in the bottom of the window well.

This morning, in an overnight spurt of growth, the vines covered the bottom half of the window, with one vine having worked its way between the mesh screen and the glass window making what I can only describe as a hand holding up two fingers.

I had planned to go fishing below the dam this morning. I changed my plans.

I don’t believe in signs or symbols.

That doesn’t mean they don’t exist…