Fly tying jumped on me from a Field and Stream article.  Before long I had learned to wrap fur, feathers, and other materials around a hook and could catch fish with the result.  My dad could work on a piece of furniture for months.  He loved the precision.  I preferred jobs I could finish in moments.  It’s been a personality trait of mine for life. I don’t know whether I can do anything about it or not. I don’t think it really matters whether I prefer five-minute or five-week projects.  Here’s a little thing I like to do when I come to church.  Sunday mornings I pull up to my office outside the door, drop Patty and our stuff off, then drive down to the back of the parking lot.  I want guests and seniors to be able to park closer to the building.  Brandon Petersen and I park at about the same spot and most Sundays walk in together.  Like I said, it’s a small thing but satisfying, and maybe it’s helpful to someone who needs a closer parking space.

I think of sudden changes in direction and preference as a conversion of sorts.  Fly fishing and fly tying were two that happened to me when I was about 16.  Fly fishing jumped on me when I was at Dog Island for spring break (by the way – American troops prepared for D-Day and the storming of the beaches of Normandy on the beaches of Dog Island. The Great General Omar Bradley was there for the training.)  I saw my friend casting a little popper to try to catch bream.  I thought it was one of the most beautiful things I’d ever seen.  Determined to learn how, I did so by reading and studying The Practical Fly Fisherman by A. J. McLane until I had it.  It was a real conversion that is still with me today, and it made my life more fun.  But the one that happened seven years later changed my life now and forever.  Compelling hobbies, activities, and work are fun and meaningful, but Jesus Christ is Lord.  I can live without the hobbies but without Jesus…

Several weeks ago Johnny Butler and I fished the Davidson River in Brevard, NC.  I couldn’t turn a trout until Johnny gave me a fly so small you could put 15 or 20 of them on a quarter.  We caught some pretty good-sized trout (20 inches) in high, off colored water.  So trout pay attention to little things.  So should I.  So should you.  Little things aren’t the only things in life.  Big picture thinking is also very important.  But the little things can catch big fish sometimes.  One friend of mine says, “Elephants do eat peanuts.”