Is there a more frustrating moment in angling than a missed strike? I experienced a number of those moments over the weekend. A philosopher might say that each one of those little incidents made me stronger, but if he (the philosopher) had been standing at streamside and voiced such an observation in the immediate aftermath of the episode I would have chopped him up for chum. We all know the feeling. We cast our fly upon the waters. It lands where we want it to land. It drifts cleanly, smoothly, sweetly on the current, riding jauntily down the clear, cold, braided waters. Anticipation has strung us as tight as a mandolin string. Then, a swirl! The fly disappears. Our heart stops for a nanosecond and a quick hit of adrenaline begins its journey through the bloodstream as the fingers holding the flyline feel the firm, urgent tug of a trout. Then, in an instant, it's over. The line is slack, the hook empty. The andrenaline goes into reverse, plunging us into a short, sharp depression.

What happened underwater where we could not see? Did the fish merely nip the fly, avoiding the hook, and spit it out? Did the fiendishly sharp point of the hook find only superficial purchase and merely prick the fish? Worse, we think, did we do something wrong? Are we just lousy anglers?

I began to think the latter after missing not one but three strikes in the same pool Saturday, only to have the Bro step into the same water and hook a fish on his first cast. What was wrong with my technique, that I failed repeatedly while he succeeded?

That question surfaced again when Doug Mawhinney of Mexico (Maine) showed up at the pool and tossed a line into water that I had just fished without success. On his first cast he hooked a four-and-a-half-pound salmon which he had to chase downstraem for a hundred yards before he was finally able to bring it to net. Why didn't I catch that fish? But then, I readily grant Doug the status of superior angler. He is, after all, the man who tied dozens and dozens of a wickedly effective fly called the Straw Man for the visiting sports at Lakewood, on the Rapid. That's what took the big salmon. He gave me one. I'm still trying to catch my first fish on it.