“In your time the innocence will fall away…”
Dateline: Jeff Gustafson and Patrick Walters
“The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
My wish for you is that you are doing what you love, that you are doing what you were put on this planet to do.
In a perfect world that is how it should be.
And while it has been an up and down struggle, feast and famine type stuff, I’m one of the lucky ones who get to be me and not someone that others think I should be.
I remember the moment I became a professional writer.
It was January 1980, the managing editor of the student newspaper at SUNY/Buffalo had just handed me a check for $20.
Twenty bucks for typing words on paper.
I can’t remember her name, I do remember the tears in her eyes. I had the front page above the fold story about an elderly woman who lived on the top floor of a semi-rundown “third floor walk-up,” and who towards the end of the month bought a few cans of cat food with the money she had left from her “monthly check.”
It was 1,840 words, here are the last five words of my first professional story: “Mary didn’t own any cats.”
I cashed the check, walked back up the three flights of stairs and put the money in Mary’s mailbox, but it was on the second landing of the walk-up where it hit me. Deep down where you mumble stuff to yourself, deep down there in the cut to the chase truth lair, deep down within my soul I heard the whisper that this here writing stuff was what I was meant to do.
I had found where I was supposed to be.
I had done what I was put here to do and with that, the look in my eyes changed forever that day.
Yesterday, I saw that look once again; it stopped me dead backstage in the fish tub line.
Two young men new to the Elites.
Two young men doing what they are supposed to be doing.
Two young men were standing where they were meant to be.
Two young men with fire in their eyes.
Meet now “50 below and the autograph.”
Jeff Gustafson (50 below)
“…feel the wind…”
“A time comes when you need to stop waiting for the man you want to become and start being the man you want to be.”
– Bruce Springsteen
“I live three hours north of Frostbite Falls…”
For those of you not as old as me, or several million other old folks, don’t be Google-mapping “Frostbite Falls,” ain’t no real place unless of course you are Rocky and Bullwinkle (Google that).
“…actually International Falls, Minn.” Yep, that’s a real place which by the way as I write this is now at minus 28-degrees.
But, Jeff lives three hours or so north of International Falls, the dude lives in Kenora, Ontario, Canada, “When I left home it was 50 below.”
That’s 50 below in Canadian degrees, down here that would translate to minus 58 degrees.
Oh yeah.
I’m chatting with him in the registration line, it’s about 70 or so outside, nice cool weather for Florida … and he is sweating.
“I actually don’t live right in Kenora, I live with my fiancée, Shelby, outside of town about 10 miles or so and down a long dirt road, we live right on Lake of the Woods.”
Lake of the Woods is 70 miles long with 14,000 or so islands and a shoreline that equals about 65,000 miles.
“It’s about a million acres of water in both Canada and Minnesota.”
Jeff, aka Gussy, “did the go to college for mom thing” at the University of Manitoba and “graduated with a degree in Geography,” which became apparent real soon in our conversation. “I live in the Canadian Shield.”
Um, huh, yeah, the what?
“It’s a huge area of clear fresh lakes and forests.”
That happens to be a bit of an understatement. The Canadian Shield is the largest mass of exposed rock on earth, some 3 million square miles, that dates back to the Precambrian Period some 4.6 billion years ago … dudes, some of those stones up there were formed when this planet was created.
Gussy’s town, Kenora, has about 15,000 people, is the smallest TV market in Canada but has some pretty cool residents which include 3 NHL Hall of Famers not to mention Victor Lindquist who won an Olympic Gold Medal for Hockey in the 1932 Winter Games.
Cool sports fact about Kenora dug up by a sports fact guru friend of mine … the Kenora Thistles in 1907 won the Stanley Cup with all local players and are the smallest town team to ever win Lord Stanley’s prize.
“…and set yourself the bolder course…”
“You need to go from wanting to change your life to deciding to change your life. If you want to live a life you’ve never lived, you have to do things you’ve never done.”
– Jen Sincero
B.A.S.S. emcee and fellow Canadian, Dave Mercer, has known Gussy for a long time and has told me that Gussy “is a real stick.”
“db, he lives way up there in Ontario. It takes me 20 or so hours to drive from my house (near Toronto) to Florida here, and it takes me the same amount of time to drive from my house to his and we both live in the same province.”
Talking with Gussy he never mentions his success in fishing, instead he tells me about his brother and sister, “My sis lives in New York City, my brother lives in Toronto, both are marathon runners, both have finished in under 2 hours and 40 minutes, which is pretty darn good.”
And then, “I’m pretty proud of them both.”
I told Gussy, from now on you’re “50 below” to which he laughed, and then he just looked at me, and said simply, “I’m ready for this.”
And for a split second a smile crossed his face, a second landing smile I know all to well.
Watch this guy.
Patrick Walters (the autograph)
“…keep your heart as open as a shrine…”
“The best way to predict the future is to create it.”
– Peter Drucker
I caught this photo a couple of seconds late (and out of focus) but here’s the reason I took it. I saw this young man come down the steps after just weighing in and as the young kids approached him for an autograph I saw the look on his face that was one of amazement and startled all in one.
This photo is of the moment of the first autographed he signed as an Elite angler.
“I felt kind of numb, it was a real moment in my life.”
Patrick Walters, 24 years old from Summerville, S.C., is a Gamecock graduate of the University of South Carolina with a degree in Business and Marketing.
A young man who came up through the college ranks where it seems, he learned well…
“You know Mr. Barone, er, db, it felt great to sign those autographs for the kids. To be honest I was one of them myself just 10 years ago. I stood where they stood and did the same thing they were doing.”
I’m not saying much, you can tell this young man understands the role he is now in, and it’s not all about catching fish.
“I thought standing there I could be an inspiration to these kids and not just with fishing but with getting an education and that maybe a little bit of encouragement will go a long way with them and that will help keep the sport great and with a future.”
That is a direct quote from a 24-year-old that now wears a jersey with his name on it as well as the word, Elite.
Then, “They believed in me, and I believe in them.”
I’m going to repeat that, “They believed in me, and I believe in them.”
I have been around a lot of professional athletes in my time and have never, never, heard any of them say what this young man just said to me.
“Did you say anything to the kids?”
“I did Mr … db.”
“What did ya’ say?”
“I told them … thank you.”
To be honest I didn’t know what I would be facing coming back to this gig with the intent to figure out who these new Elites are, what makes them tick, drill deep to find out why you should care about ‘em.
In these last few days I’ve met four strangers from the East Coast, the South and from another country … Canada.
Knew not a one before I stood in front of them and flipped open my notebook and clicked the pen to the on position.
So how do I feel about these guys so far? Honesty is what you want, experience is good but my gut is best.
My room in the hotel near the stage is on the second floor. I can see launch from my window. I can see them out there sitting in their boats, see them idle down the dock and hear their names called out, watch them clear the no wake zone and then launch their bass boats into the game, and their future.
Once again from the second landing, I smile.
I know all about being in the place you were born to be, doing what your soul was meant to do.
And so far, that is what I see here.
db
“…you’ll sail the perfect line.”
In Your Time
Bob Seger
“In time, young men, you will learn that the real journey, lies within, you.”
– db