The manner of the birding
I've quoted Luke Jennings before, from his excellent book 'Blood Knots', but it's worth doing so again:
"The late Bernard Venables, author of the classic Mr Crabtree fishing books, used to say that there are three stages to the angler's evolution. To begin with, as a child, you just want to catch fish - any fish. Then you move to the stage where you want to catch big fish. And finally, with nothing left to prove, you reach a place where it's the manner of the catch that counts, the rigour and challenge of it, at which point the whole thing takes on an intellectual and perhaps even a philosophical cast."
With apologies to Bernard Venables, I think we could amend this quote to the following:
"There are three stages to the birder's evolution. To begin with, as a child, you just want to watch birds - any birds. Then you move to the stage where you want to see rare birds. And finally, with nothing left to prove, you reach a place where it's the manner of the birding that counts, the rigour and challenge of it, at which point the whole thing takes on an intellectual and perhaps even a philosophical cast."
Does that ring true with any of you lot out there? It does with me...
"The late Bernard Venables, author of the classic Mr Crabtree fishing books, used to say that there are three stages to the angler's evolution. To begin with, as a child, you just want to catch fish - any fish. Then you move to the stage where you want to catch big fish. And finally, with nothing left to prove, you reach a place where it's the manner of the catch that counts, the rigour and challenge of it, at which point the whole thing takes on an intellectual and perhaps even a philosophical cast."
With apologies to Bernard Venables, I think we could amend this quote to the following:
"There are three stages to the birder's evolution. To begin with, as a child, you just want to watch birds - any birds. Then you move to the stage where you want to see rare birds. And finally, with nothing left to prove, you reach a place where it's the manner of the birding that counts, the rigour and challenge of it, at which point the whole thing takes on an intellectual and perhaps even a philosophical cast."
Does that ring true with any of you lot out there? It does with me...
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