[Walking back from superb fly-fishing on Magic Island, in my favorite shoes, I think of saints and mystics.] Catherine of Siena, for example, said, "All the way to heaven is heaven." On the face of it, I was thinking the other day, this is an insanely optimistic statement that flies in the face of a ton of our grimmest experiences. Yet Catherine of Siena was no fool. Nor was she sheltered. She lived in a time of hatred, and she made her outrageous statement even though half of Italy and beloved members of her family were killed, during her early childhood, by the Black Death.

Catherine owned no felt-soled wading shoes, I was thinking, and so maybe took no Magic Island walks. But my theory is that she walked around feeling as though she was playing a fish like my Magic Island Brown Trout anyway. Catherine of Siena, it seemed to me in my favorite shoes the other day, somehow hooked an invisible and interior fish that somehow connected her to kingdom and electrocuted her daily with joy.
David James Duncan, on fishing and his favorite shoes (Patagonia waders)