Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/299259
S P O R T I N G C L A S S I C S 9 8 T he first day of trout season usually filled him with excitement. Even as a man he felt like a boy awaiting Christmas morning on the eve of the trout opener. Sleep eluded him and the night seemed endless. Last night was the same but for different reasons. Watching his wife sleep, he eased his arms gently, reluctantly, from under her, hoping not to waken her. He walked to the kitchen, started the coffee and stoked the wood stove. Soon the fire would hold its own against the cold. Outside, spring still struggled to lift its head and the grass wore a half-inch jacket of snow on this last Saturday in April. Under the porch light, the tulips she had planted years earlier slumped with heads bowed, weak from winter, looking like mourners. They always reminded him of her, and especially today. It was their anniversary. Gathering himself to leave, he stopped momentarily at her door and leaned against the jamb. "Hey, Tulip, I'm off," he whispered. "Will you catch one for me?" "Always for you." "You promise?" "Yes." He paused to gather himself again. "I'll miss you." "I'll be with you." Her voice faltered. "Is it cold out?" she asked, hiding her emotion. "Yes. It snowed." "You be careful." "I will." When he bent to kiss her, she didn't lift her head from the pillow. T he sun never appeared as he drove the two-hour distance north to the stream. Instead, the morning walked up and over the horizon dressed in grey, his companion for the rest of the day. Winding around the old air force base, he remembered as a boy waiting eagerly to see the jet fighters lined up like steel warriors, gone with the Cold War now except for the runways, hangars and barracks. His dad used to complain that a man with a mortar and half a mind to could sneak near that fence over there and wipe them all out just like Pearl Harbor. "Why do they line them up like that anyway?" he remembered his dad asking. Back then, his father's