Fels-Naptha Soap (I don’t know why…just because)

Found this old bar of soap tucked away in my Aunt’s hoarding house. Ironically/caustically…I remember Fels-Naptha Soap being dispensed by the U.S. Army for shower use to me in the late  1960’s. The Private’s privates survived! Not sure why I posted about this…saw the pic I took and thought ‘what the hell’.

“Lazarus Fels and his son Abraham founded Fels and Company in Baltimore. The business eventually failed and Lazarus Fels’s brother Joseph became a salesman representing two Philadelphia soap manufacturing businesses (1893).

He eventually purchased Thomas Worsley and Company and renamed it Fels and Company of Philadelphia. The business remained in the control of the Fels family until it was sold to the Purex Corporation in 1964.

The Fels family were philanthropists, and contributed to a variety of worthy causes, including the establishment of two arts and crafts communities, one of which in Arden, Delaware still exists.” (more)

Fly Fishing: Early Season Fun…Finally

In the Pacific NW, most of the Western U.S., unless you are blessed with year around open waters (fishing season open) or you are a heroic Winter Steelhead fly fisher) you wait for the season to open in the Spring. Depending upon altitude, some waters open in April and some a bit later in May.

All this waiting is usually coupled with planning, studying up, tying flies, tinkering with the gear, and more planning. It is the anticipation, the what if’s and the recollections of having done it before and what it brings to the psyche when it all goes even partially right.

It is the fresh air, the traveling and anticipation, the rush to get on the water, the possible sunshine! and warmth!, using the flies you tied and the success of those creations, “the moment” and the aftermath of feeling connected, at one, at peace…if even for a little bit. It is how one’s life should be, even off the water.