I moseyed down to Housatonic Meadows State Park late Saturday morning on Aug. 16 for a Trout Unlimited smallmouth bass event put on by the Mianus chapter.
“Wait a sec,” you say. “If it’s Trout Unlimited, why are they fishing for smallmouth bass?”
The answer is two-fold.
First, the Housatonic River in summer is primarily a smallmouth fishery. The water is too warm for trout but it doesn’t bother the bass much.The trout are hiding out in the thermal refuge areas and are off-limits until mid-September.
Second, the word “unlimited” suggests wiggle room.
When I rolled in there was a small pop-up tent with the words “Trout Unlimited” on it set up by the upper parking lot. Being a trained observer, I spotted this vital clue almost immediately.
There was a folding table under the tent. It was empty, but it seemed likely there would be food on it at some point.
Trained observers are also patient. I tabled the food question and motored down to the lower parking area, where I beheld half a dozen men with fly rods casting into the low, slow river with varying degrees of proficiency and enthusiasm.
The nearest to me turned out to be Eddie Curtis, who hails from southern New Jersey. “About 15 minutes from Philly,” he said.
Curtis was a fortuitous choice of subject. Chatty and easy-going, he embarked on an angling monologue that included adventures on salt and fresh water and an incisive critique of fish and game practices in his home state.
All the while he chucked lazy downstream casts. On about every tenth one, he hooked a smallish smallmouth bass.
I asked him what fly he was using. The answer -- a black Wooly Bugger -- wasn’t surprising. That’s a standard pattern for this kind of fishing. Almost a cliche.
Curtis was using a black Wooly Bugger with an unusual feature — a little propeller or spinner.Patrick L. Sullivan
But this was different in that it had a little propeller attached just below the hook eye.
I last saw something like this in the mid-1990s in New Mexico, where a rustic saloon I just happened to be in had a small display case of standard trout flies with the same kind of propellers attached. The brand name was “Pistol Pete.”
Curtis said they work almost too well. He jerked his thumb behind him and said “He ties them for me.”
I resolved to catch up with “he” when everybody took a break.
I ambled back to the car and exchanged camera and notebook for rod and vest.
I tried four different flies, two surface and two subsurface, and failed to move anything.
Not anxious to perform the Walk of Shame, I tried a black Wooly Bugger, no propeller.
That did the trick.
Back up at the tent my finely honed instincts proved correct.Food had materialized, in the form of two giant submarine sandwiches, a couple of jumbo bags of potato chips, and sodas.
Gerald Berrafati was in charge of this. He is the chapter coordinator for the Mianus Trout Unlimited chapter, and he was talking a mile a minute about various dam removal and stream reclamation projects in his bailiwick.
Since the state of Connecticut east of New Hartford and south of Torrington is a complete mystery to me, I had only a vague idea where these places were.
But it sounded good.
Antoine Bissieux, who does business as “The French Fly Fisherman,” made a cameo appearance. Some years back he was with a couple of sports on the Hous in similar circs — warm, low, late summer -- and I swapped him a handful of mop flies for a sampler of his perdigon nymphs. If he remembered this he didn’t let on.
The six or eight of us at the tent did a number on the chow and talked some guff between bites. The sandwiches were good. So was the guff.
Warren Nesteruk of Southbury (I think) said his wife was giving him a hard time about having so many fly rods.
I asked how many he had.
“Fifteen,” he replied.
When I informed him I had something like 80 rods, he grew thoughtful, as if my awful example might buy him some space.
Then it struck him.
“You’re not married, are you.”
One loose end remained. I hate loose ends, and I wanted to find the fellow who added propellers to his flies.
But they had left.
So if you read this, Eddie Curtis of south Jersey, drop me a line. I’d like to find out if they really do work almost too well.
Proffitt and her husband and business partner, Robert Bristow, are well-known leaders in the art and architecture communities, and their home, studio and workshop in Lakeville; store and office at 16 Main St. in Salisbury; and gallery space in Norfolk are vibrant hubs for arts and design in the region.
Proffitt has been coming to the area since she was a teenager. Originally from Puerto Rico, her family moved to the New York City area in the 1970’s. Her artist and architect father encouraged her interests in art and design and her deep desire to create. At school, she excelled in math and art and soon realized that this was all she wanted to do. “Think logically and then break the mold with creativity,” she said.
Armed with a degree in visual art from Trinity College, she pursued advanced studies at Berkeley and Pratt before receiving a master’s degree in architecture from Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia, where she met Bristow. Both landed apprenticeships in Boston and were drawn to the arts community in Norfolk centered around the Yale Summer Arts Program. The area quickly became their personal and family anchor.
They started Poesis, a furniture design and manufacturing studio, with a small loan from her mother. They landed a major house project and soon met a hotelier at a party who hired them on the spot to design a hotel in Washington, D.C.
Proffitt said, “I was hooked because it combined everything I wanted to do creatively: design experiences in the broadest sense with all the supporting pieces of the puzzle — furniture, objects, art. My father felt that architecture was the Renaissance profession: It holds the seeds of art, design, engineering and all the other ingredients. For me, it all starts with art.”
A rendering of King Winery, one of Pilar Proffitt’s current interior design projects.Provided
Proffitt is devoted to the area. She and Bristow raised their family in Lakeville. Their daughter Grace, a sculptor, attended Hotchkiss and is pursuing her MFA at University of Pennsylvania. Their daughter Ellis, also a graduate of Hotchkiss and Trinity, is a mathematician and aspiring actress in Los Angeles; and their son Sam attended Salisbury School and is a junior at Trinity, majoring in art history with a minor in architecture. They all are carrying forward the family’s passion for arts, architecture and design.
Proffitt’s interior design work and unique furniture pieces welcome visitors at Hotchkiss’ Art Center, the Scoville Memorial Library, her own wHole hOuse shop in Salisbury and, soon, across the street in the new Jam Food Shop, which is expected to open this fall.
The region’s many museums and galleries include some of Proffitt’s favorites, from Mass MoCA and the Clark to Salisbury’s Geary, Mad Rose in Millerton, Jack Shainman in Kinderhook and Art Omi in Ghent. Proffitt loves the connections and new opportunities brought to the community by the increase in full-time residents, as well as impromptu get-togethers with friends — recently watching a Knicks playoff game at the tavern bar at the White Hart. Moments like that keep her grounded here.
In addition to the White Hart, Proffitt is a fan of area restaurants, including Fern for a quick pasta at the bar; Isabela in Amenia, where Michelin-starred chef Jose Ramirez Ruiz is from Puerto Rico; and Clare de Boer’s Stissing House in Pine Plains.
A perfect day for Proffitt is spent working in her studio overlooking Lake Wononscopomuc, without distractions, rain or shine. It is a quiet and peaceful place that supports her many architecture and design projects. When asked what she would say to a younger version of herself just starting a career, she responded, “Don’t be so shy. As one of my professors told me, ‘Sometimes you just have to crash the party.’ Draw, write, run, play tennis. And travel!”
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