“So take the photographs…”
Dateline: Sylvia Morris, President CT BASS Nation
“Feeling gratitude, and not expressing it, is like wrapping a present and not giving it.”
–William Arthur Ward
Know this, Sylvia Morris is going to kick my arse for writing this.
So be it.
Sylvia, my friend, this is payback for either telling me “No!!!” or flat out ignoring my question every year when I ask, “Hey lady any chance I can do a story with you.”
I’m writing a story about you WITHOUT you because we have been friends so long I know you, I know how much you love what you do, how much you love all the members of the Connecticut B.A.S.S. Nation, how much you love B.A.S.S., but most of all I can write this without you because I know this, I will forever be grateful for your meatballs.
And hugs.
Next, a sentence I knew one day would come, but hope would not.
Sylvia Morris, President of the CT B.A.S.S. Nation for the past several years, is stepping down.
This Saturday will be her last CT B.A.S.S. Nation banquet as Prez, I couldn’t be there for her meatballs and hugs, probably couldn’t say much of this to her face without breaking down anyway, will have to in a few days pick her up at the airport for the B.A.S.S. Nation Championship.
That’s when my arse will be kicked.
Kicked by a maybe 5 foot tall crazy Italian Yinzer (Pittsburghese for a Pittsburgh native) who bleeds Black and Gold for her beloved Steelers.
Who also bleeds white and silver, the color of the CT B.A.S.S. Nation jerseys.
“…and still frames in your mind…”
“Average leaders raise the bar on themselves; good leaders raise the bar for others; great leaders inspire others to raise their own bar.”
~Orrin Woodward
Tomorrow I will step on a plane and fly halfway across the country to the B.A.S.S. Nation Championship, and event I look forward to every year.
To be honest I could probably get out of doing this event, but I wouldn’t think of doing that, I spend the year covering the face of B.A.S.S., the Elites, this is my time to cover the backbone of B.A.S.S., the Nation members.
I was asked if when I get to the airport on the 13th could I wait and pick up a competitor from South Africa and bring him to the event location, Lake Conroe. I said no problem, but in a few minutes this email came back to me: Never mind…..he leaves South Africa on the 13th and arrives the 15th!
How do you not love these people who do that for us, and I mean that when I say, “us,” those at B.A.S.S., take away the Nation, might as well take away us.
So, as I give Sylvia a moment to compose herself as someone from the banquet hands her a printed version of this story, I want to use the makeup fix moment to also thank ALL THE PRESIDENTS AND VOLUNTEERS who make the B.A.S.S. Nation run, if you folks at the CT Banquet wouldn’t mind, please stand now and give them all a hand.
Imagine all the work needed, unpaid, countless hours given up so other people can follow their dreams, that’s special folks, that’s benevolence at it’s grass roots.
They don’t have to do it you know, but do it they do.
And out of their work and sacrifice, young men and women have the chance to one day walk across the Bassmaster Classic stage.
And out of their work and sacrifice on Nation angler WON the Bassmaster Classic, Bryan Kerchal a young man who went from cook to champion.
Bryan Kerchal was killed shortly after winning the Bassmaster Classic.
Bryan was a CT B.A.S.S. Nation angler.
Sylvia can’t say his name without her lower lip quivering. That my friends are what these Presidents and volunteers are made of.
It is a flat out privilege to tell their story.
“…hang it on a shelf…”
“To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart.”
–Eleanor Roosevelt
Meatballs & Hugs.
I have watched Sylvia pack lunches for the whole team.
I have watched, no, driven Sylvia to the grocery store to get food to make dinner for the whole team including many times spouses and others.
I am not sure in the 10 years I have been at a Nation gigs I have ever been able to get in and out of the gig without Sylvia handing me a plate of food.
And a hug.
I will miss the meatballs.
I will cherish the hugs.
I have become family to Sylvia, and her husband, Jimmy, a retired railroad guy who tries to hide the fact his heart is almost as big as his wife’s.
Sylvia doesn’t drive, never has, she worked for 20+ years at an Italian restaurant near her house (I can’t be real exact on some of this stuff because it would involve a call to Sylvia and she would shut this story down pretty quick if she knew) last year she retired from the joint, a few weeks later it shut down.
Could have been a lot of reasons for that shut down, me, I believe the soul of the place left, the joint now is a parking lot.
I have watched tears run down her cheeks when one of the team didn’t do so well, I’ve watched her get 6 feet tall when one on the team has done well.
When she talks of the team it is in the same voice that she talks about her elderly father who lives with her, love.
When I watch her watch the team launch I always think the experience is out there on the water, the soul of the team though, is standing on the dock.
“…in good health and good time, it’s something unpredictable…”
“Average leaders raise the bar on themselves; good leaders raise the bar for others; great leaders inspire others to raise their own bar.”
~Orrin Woodward
To the Nation Presidents and all those volunteers please accept my public gratitude for what it is you do, and give me the time here to tell you what it is you do.
You make dreams possible.
That is about as honorable a gift as you can give someone.
All dreams need help, all dreams need pushing, all dreams need then for the dream maker to get out of the way.
The best know that.
You know that, and from someone who dreamed, from someone who was pushed, from someone who was believed in and let go to chase on his own, you ARE INVALUABLE to the sport and to those who play it.
To those in the launched boats never forget those back on the docks.
No one my friends ever launches alone.
When you take home the trophy bring it to your local jeweler, have him or her engrave on the trophy the names of all those through whose efforts helped you raise the iron above your head.
CT B.A.S.S. NATION winner, put Sylvia’s name right below yours.
Sylvia, deserves it.
“…but in the end it’s right…”
“Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be.”
~Ralph Waldo Emerson
Meatballs & Hugs.
To Sylvia I am flat out a better human being to have crossed your path, love and hugs back to you from Barb and I.
I remember the first time we met, a fishing show at the CT Convention Center, it was a week or two before I began this gig full time.
I knew nothing.
You never judged me on that fact, instead you help guide me down the path that has lead to some of the best times in my life.
I became family to this sport through you, I am family to the CT B.A.S.S. Nation even though there is no membership card with my name on it.
To the CT B.A.S.S. Nation I have always been told that no one is irreplaceable and I believed that until I met the one person who was, irreplaceable.
Sylvia.
Vinny, as the new CT B.A.S.S. Nation Major Domo, I love you too man, but good God dude you have the follow up to measure up to of all time.
You my friend just took Babe Ruth’s place in the rotation.
To Jimmy, hook up that new Tundra you just bought and go fishing with your yinzer gal from the neighborhood, may you have a thousand casts together, may you have a thousand meatballs and hugs.
Sylvia, wish I could be there on this your night, FEDEX me some meatballs to the hotel at Lake Conroe.
I will though be standing at airport baggage waiting to pick you up, yes I remember.
I will be there, waiting for the hugs.
Love,
db
“…I hope you had the time of your life.”
Time Of Your Life
Green Day
“We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.”
–Thornton Wilder