The other day as I was thinking about Kevin’s impact on my life and I pulled a memory out of the recesses of my brain that I hadn’t thought about for years.  This isn’t a typical or especially fun memory of Kevin nor is it a fishing memory, but it is one of a time where he and I grew in understanding of each other and was probably the real start of our friendship.

Shortly after I graduated high school in 1989, I was diagnosed with a strange illness called ITP.  It is an autoimmune illness where your spleen basically turns on you and starts filtering all of the platelets out of your blood.  It is pretty bad because you could easily bleed to death, like a hemophiliac might, with a traumatic injury.  As you can imagine I had A LOT of blood tests during the course of the illness. It was on many of these occasions that I would run into Kevin, who was working as a phlebotomist at St. Mark’s Hospital in Salt Lake City.  Kevin had only recently returned from his mission to Frankfurt, Germany – where I would be called to serve a few short months later – and was embarking on the first steps of his career in medicine.

The months after high school graduation are typically pretty care free days for most, but for me, they were filled with a fair amount of worry and loneliness as I tried to overcome the effects of this illness and, at times, wondering if I ever would.  I remember that my nose would bleed for nearly an hour for no reason other than my blood was so thin it wouldn’t stay in my capillaries.  My legs and arms would be covered in bruises from the slightest of bumps.  Additionally, the only pharmaceutical based treatment and first line of defense was prednisone, which is an effective, yet horrible steroid tablet that causes severe water retention and acne – not really the look most 18 year olds are going for.  It was a source of some real misery for me.

I remember Kevin drawing my blood and doing a pretty good job of it as well.  But mostly I remember how he made me feel.  He and I would talk while he drew the samples each week or if he happened to be in the lab when I stopped by.  Of course his smile always shone through and instantly set me at ease.  We would make small talk mostly about fishing or perhaps remembering times when we were younger and I was playing in his family’s yard.  Regardless of the topic, he lifted my spirits and helped me to see a brighter side.

Ultimately, I ended up having my spleen removed to permanently fix the problem.  I believe Kevin even helped care for me after my surgery at the hospital.  Thankfully, other than a big scar and one less organ, I don’t really suffer any long term problems from this illness.  I am lucky blessed.  I don’t really know why.  Obviously in retrospect, looking at the way Kevin suffered his most cruel illness with absolute grace, dignity, and defiance, my troubles weren’t so bad and I maybe could have borne them better.  I remember when I first heard that his cancer was back I was so sad.  I immediately sent him an email suggesting we plan a fishing trip soon, thinking that perhaps it might never happen.  How wrong I was.  In the typical fly-by-the-seat-of-his-pants style by which Kevin lived his life, he replied almost instantaneously suggesting that we get together two weeks later for a float down the Green (the subject of a later post).  I could see he wasn’t going to take this illness lying down or feeling sorry for himself and I was supremely grateful for the opportunity to share the only healing balm I have – fishing.  It meant so much to me to give back some of the kindness he had shown me when I was ill.  Most especially I am grateful for the time it afforded us to reconnect.

What I learned from Kevin is that no matter what the situation, there is always room to make a person feel a little better, to cut through the negative and get to the heart of joy by connecting with them in a real way through simple kindness and a big smile. I am nowhere nearly as good as he was at it, but it helps to have such a great example for inspiration.

Somewhere above the Mythical Confluence

Read Part 1

My first fishing adventure with Kevin was about 3 years ago in October 2008.  We happened to both be at a mission reunion for Fall LDS General Conference.  I was shocked to see him there since I knew he was living in San Clemente, CA.  It was so great catching up with him.  As were about to part ways, he said, “this may sound crazy, but do you want to come fishing with me and Andrew tomorrow?”  I was about to say that I needed to work, when thankfully my wife Crystal told me to go and convinced me I could figure what to do about that.  When I told him I would go he said, “Ok, meet us in Evanston, Wyoming at 3AM.”  Only Kevin would think that was a good idea.  I have fished for a long time and know that most fish like an hour or two after sunrise to wake up, but I agreed just the same.

I showed up in Evanston at particular gas station at the appointed hour.  I walked into the gas station to find Kevin in one of his famous conversations with a complete stranger where they sounded like old friends as he calls them by name (which is gleaned from their name tag or simply asking).  When he is in that mode you can’t quite tell if he is hassling them or just really enjoying connecting with another person.  You soon learn it is mostly the latter, although I still think there is an element of hassle in there.  These conversations can happen anywhere at anytime.

As we moved on to the parking lot with our gas station sandwiches and sodas, Kevin began to spin yarns about the “mythical confluence” of two streams outside of Cokeville, Wyoming.  These waters were sure to hold a bounty of native cutthroat trout.  I found that Kevin had also brought along his son Josh and that we were to meet his nephew Zach at Sage Creek Junction.  Once we were all together we headed to Cokeville.  Stopped into the truck stop for some more Kevin magic with the locals and then headed back on the longest dirt road I have ever driven.  In the excitement I forgot to fill my gas tank and after about 20 miles on this road we began to descend on the valley containing the mythical confluence.  Somehow the steep downhill grade caused what remaining gas I had to rush away from any in take line and my car stalled.  Furthermore, I realized that I had not one, but two flat tires.  I ended up gently coasting down the hill to a parking spot, where I assessed the damage.  Thankfully I was able to repair the flat tires, but was wondering what on earth I would do about the gas.  We were in the middle of nowhere with no one around for miles, except a lone hunter in a pickup truck who warned us about a black bear he had seen recently where we were fishing and also had no extra gas.  We threw caution to the wind and decided we’d better start fishing.

Josh displays a trophy, yes there is a fish in that picture.

The section of the river we fished was full of a series of beaver dams which contained mostly small trout.  We had fun catching them and made sure that Josh landed a few before we moved on to see if we could find an more intriguing water to fish.  We wandered around in a thicket of willows for an hour or so and discovered that we were above the mythical confluence as we found another stream to the south of where we started.  With two bursts of the famous Hegewald family call, we all gathered together to go back to the cars and move on.  I thought I would hop in my car to see if it would start and by some miracle it did, so we all moved downstream a little ways.  We came on a nice long riffle stretch which we determined was now below the mythical confluence as we all began to call it.  One thing you learn about Kevin after spending any amount of time with him is that he has a most interesting way with the English language and uses amazing words in ways I don’t think they were meant, but it totally works for him.  That is one of the things I loved most about being around Kevin.  He would use some word he pulled out of the air and just go with it and it would totally crack me up.

Fish of the day!

We began to fish this beautiful run, but thankfully I got a little jump on everyone and within about 10 casts hooked and landed the fish of the day.  An absolute bruiser of a trout.  It was a beautiful 16 inch native cutthroat that ate the streamer I was fishing.  This really enthused the entire party again and we spent the next 2-3 hours fishing this long run with great success, albiet by catching a horde of mountain whitefish. We had an absolute blast.  We all caught fish.  I was able to help Josh and Zach get into several fish using nymphs which I am not sure they had really done before.  Thanks to Mr. Whitey we walked away from the stream satisfied, mostly – except for Kevin.

He thought that we’d better give the lower portion of the river, closer to Cokeville a good once over before nightfall and the drive home.  Kevin climbed in my car and we headed back along the dirt road back to town.  I was a complete nervous wreck that I would run out of gas.  Somehow we made it back to paved road with air in tires and running on fumes.  Of course instead of heading back to the gas station to fill up first, Kevin insisted we explore every side road that might take us back to the river regardless of how likely we were to get filled with buckshot for trespassing.  We stopped a few times to fish and I sweated bullets every time I went to start the car.  We finally and miraculously made it back to gasoline and microwave pizzas at the truck stop. YUM!

What I learned from Kevin is that you can’t let a little thing like the possibility of running out of gas in the middle of nowhere – where you would most likely have to spend the night in the freezing cold – ruin your fun.  That IS the fun!  Push it to the edge and enjoy the bounces if you tumble over the side.  This is something I am not very good at, but he helped me see that it was possible and always full of rewards!

The Intrepid Hegewald Band of Brothers

Read part 3

Kevin Hegewald: 1968-2011

I can’t go forward today without writing a tribute to a man I am honored to call one of my friends and one of the most remarkable people I have known. My friend Kevin Hegewald, passed away on September 20th after a long, valiant, and courageous battle with cancer. He faced this challenge with dignity and verve and vowed that his suffering wouldn’t get the best of his enjoyment of life. In fact I would say that even though cancer won the battle, Kevin won the war with his dogged determination to have as much fun as possible in his remaining days.

I have known Kevin my whole life as a neighbor and friend. We grew up about one block away from each other and I have always enjoyed spending time with him, whether it was while hanging out with his sister Christy, or during his band practices and gigs with my brother Jamie, or most especially in recent years when he would call me at strange hours to go on some crazy fishing adventure with him and his family.

Kevin has a smile that is absolutely electric and he is able to make everyone around him feel like a friend. His sense of humor is unmatched and possibly only outdone by his always entertaining choice of words in any situation. Kevin has a “zest” for life, which is a word I will always associate with him. He used to call his little sister, Christy (who is my age), Zest as a nickname when we were in first grade. Nicknames are also very plentiful with Kevin. I think he has given everyone he knows at least 3-10 nicknames which he will pull out randomly yet always appropriate to the situation.

Kevin and I have shared many connections in life. Of course growing up near each other we know so many of the same people. We both served missions for the LDS church in the greatest mission in the world − Frankfurt, Germany. We both have deep convictions about our faith. We love the same music. We love fishing of just about any kind, but especially fly fishing. It was thanks to this common interest, that I really got to know Kevin more deeply…

Read Part 2 & 3

Little Dell Bonneville Cutthroat Trout

Mountain & Little Dell’s Bonneville Cutthroat Trout via KUTV

From This is Fly Daily

via LOADED.

Goat Head Gear Logo

Howdy everyone. It’s been a while since my last post. I have had my nose to the grindstone for the last 11 months as a self-employed consultant and working on a couple of other businesses to boot. The one I am most excited about called Goat Head Gear is getting closer to reality. My business partner and I have been working hard on our first product, a small shoe screw for trail running and wading, called Sole Spikes™.  You can apply the screw into the lug of any running shoe, hiking boot, or wading shoe, generally about 10 screws per shoe.  They provide AMAZING traction in winter/trail running and provide some real bite when wading, particularly with the newer rubber soled boots.  We started this process over a year ago and have been refining our design and working with engineers to get a killer product at a great price.  We are working on the first real prototype to be completed in the next 2-3 weeks.  If that is successful we will start the process of officially launching our product.  The cool news is that we are introducing our product as a project on Kickstarter.com where we will be using “crowd funding” to help pay for our initial costs.  We have some nice thank you gifts for those who are kind enough to donate.  We hope to have that live in the next couple of weeks.  Please stay tuned for updates and of course it would be great to have your support on the campaign.  Check it out today.  Enjoy!

This is Fly Daily

via TARPON AND GLASS MINNOWS.

This is a great post on the Utah on the Fly forums with some nice how to video on some unique fly patterns.  Check it out and get out fishing soon.

Fly Fishing Utah – The Utah Fly Fishing Resource

via Strawberry Fodder.

I came across this great handmade bird field guide from a blog that I follow called, A Field Journal, written by Olivia Kanaley.  She has some really creative photo sets that find appealing, but of course, a hand painted bird field guide is something that I can’t pass up sharing.  Enjoy other images on the link below.

via Watercolor Wings.

What warbler is this?

On a recent trip to the Snake River in Wyoming, I spotted this cute little yellow bird, which I had guessed to be a yellow warbler, but looking closer I think it might be a Nashville Warbler.  The pictures aren’t the greatest, but hopefully someone out there can weigh in with an opinion. Comment below. Thanks. Other views: Jumping to a branch, eating a worm, and not very focused.