A bright young man who is a close relative of mine has taken up fasting, not for religious reasons that I know of, but simply as a kind meditative self-awareness exercise.

He once pitched a tent on a remote Maine beach for nearly a week surviving only on broth. He returned, seemingly none the worse for wear, with a big smile and positive affirmations about his week of privation.

Not my cup of tea, this fasting thing. I love to eat. I counseled him to be careful, that he could be compromising his immune system. I added this old timer’s admonition: “Too much self-introspection is not always healthy, my boy. Life has taught me that.”

What do you think? Self-awareness books and discussions have never been my thing, so I could be wrong. But life does teach you lessons along the way.

Perhaps I am a meditative soul and have just not admitted it to myself. When deer hunting, I sit for hours in a tree stand with only a thermos of hot tea to keep me company. A few times in my life, when the burdens were the most heavy, fervent prayers to my Creator passed the time in my tree stand. Much of that time, too, was used for just clearing my mind, or simply thinking about the past or pondering the future.

One common theme has continually haunted me, but not in a bad way. I remain astonished and deeply appreciative of how my best outdoor experiences came about as a result of mostly unplanned, serendipitous connections with others. My father, bless him, brought me along to learn and hone my passions, hunting and fishing. As a geeky, reclusive teen deep into electronics and amateur radio at the time, a complete stranger in my Houlton neighborhood took me under his wing. He showed me the way and lit a spark that opened up so many vocational and avocational opportunities in my later adult years.

“On what slender threads do life and fortunes hang!” wrote Alexandre Dumas. You cannot help but wonder whether your life would have been less fulfilling or less joyous if the slender threads, like the stars, had not aligned for you.

We are not supposed to make idols or gods of transitory inanimate objects or hobbies. I do resist, but fly fishing on a remote trout pond, when the hatch is on, comes close to a spiritual experience for me. And strange as it seems, I cannot, try as I may, recall what slender thread first led me to a fly rod and a remote trout pond. It was not my dad, nor was it anybody close to me whose memory I can resurrect after all these years.

A philosopher whose name also escapes me said that really understanding our personal stories is a spiritual quest, that these experiences are what makes us “fully human.”

Poet Robert Frost wrote about the “road not taken” that figures into the calculus of choices made by all of us. In my life the slender thread often led me to those choices.

Sportsman or not, you should be able to find some personal thankfulness on how the slender threads shaped your life.

 

V. Paul Reynolds is editor of the Northwoods Sporting Journal, an author, a Maine guide and host of a weekly radio program, “Maine Outdoors,” heard at 7 p.m. Sundays on The Voice of Maine News-Talk Network. Contact him at vpaulr@tds.net.