Rick Moffat
CFL.ca
The sacks and tackle stats aren’t coming so often in the double-teamed world of Eric Wilson, but he’s doubling his good fortunes off the field. Two rings last year, and two major off-season milestones this year . “The Humidor” has much to be thankful for.
Another world away this Thanksgiving weekend, the “keeper of the Cup” from the Montreal 2009 victory is thinking of her Alouettes family while devoting her time to her very special new family. Genevieve Harbec has traded 46 football players and her spot on the sidelines for bonding with 32 boys and young men at a homeless shelter in Peru.
The Humidor is immovable on defence but loves to chug out of the backfield on short-yardage offensive plays. He may be getting the same treatment as Avon Cobourne (less carries is more) in the Air Trestman Era, but he’ll never miss a blocking assignment. And if there’s a milestone occasion in your life like a Grey Cup victory party or the birth of your first child, the Humidor is your guy.
Besides being a defensive force for the Als, DT Eric Wilson is also a cigar aficionado off the field.
“Grey Cup I went with Cohiba Esplendidos,” says the gregarious former Blue Bomber and Miami Dolphin now in his fourth season with the Als. “I passed out cigars to whoever wanted them…went through a box of 25.”
Wilson laughs out loud when I tell him that Coach Marc Trestman has complained to me that he never got a victory cigar. Neither did Ben Cahoon, though he wouldn’t have wanted one anyway.
2009 was Wilson’s Year of the Rings: the wedding ring in May, then the Grey Cup. 2010 is the year of the family: a new house and a new love of his life. A daughter.
“For the birth of my baby girl Kayliana, I went with Partagas serie D, no. 4. That’s a reserva,” Wilson explains. He married his college sweetheart Janessa, a varsity gymnast at Michigan, so Kayliana certainly has the deep end of the athletic gene pool. “We were 98-percent sure it was a boy…until the second half came out!”
What started as a way of chillaxing with Junior Seau has become another true love, maybe appreciation is a better word, of the cigar.
“I have four different humidors—maduro in one (darker wraps), then one for Connecticut wrap, Cubans in another, then cigars that are less than 10-bucks.”
The Humidor is an aficionado on a budget after all.
“Hey man if you smoke and understand, then I give you a better one.”
Wilson got into the cigar business while with the Dolphins and isn’t ruling out a new venture in “sticks” after football.
“I’ve got my ‘mule’ to supply the Cubans,” he confesses laughingly.
So are Victory Cigars for November already on order?
“Dude, it’s way too early to think about November Victory cigars. We just need to get back on track as a defence. I think I’ve done my job well this season but the numbers don’t show it. Coach tells me to ‘take 2 (blocks) and hold the middle’.”
What about offensive stats? “Yeah, I should get a touchdown clause in my contract…but like Avon I should get the rock more!”
Several thousand kilometres away, Genevieve Harbec, the daughter of the Alouettes’ visitors’ locker-room manager is thankful she’s gotten to know children of the dusty streets.
She’s learning as much about herself as she is about the warm, loving, clever kids of Casa Hogar Nino Jesus (you can support this fabulous work this Thanksgiving through www.casahogarninojesus.org and making a donation through their Canadian partner “Fondation Formons Une Famille a/s Casa Hogar Nino Jesus – Peru, 480, boul. Roland-Therrien, Longueuil (Québec) J4H 3V9)
After the Als’ victory parade last December, Genevieve would tote the Cup around Montreal from party to party in a well-worn hockey bag. How Canadian is that, eh?
It was the culmination of a life lived around the team. She’s tagged along with Dad since the Alouettes were reborn in 1996, helping in the visitors’ clubhouse and on the sidelines with water bottles during games. She was only 12 when she started.
Genevieve grew up assisting the physiotherapists and in the Equipment Room with Ronnie James and Jacques Guilbeault. She may be the only aid worker in Peru who can tape your ankles and put a facemask on a helmet.
Als 2009 ‘Keeper of the Cup’ Genevieve Harbec is in Peru helping orphans and street kids.
One of the days she’s most thankful for is the day she jumped onto a Grey Cup Victory Parade float in 2002.
But after the ’09 parade, Genevieve went on the naked bootleg of a lifetime. She flew to Peru before Christmas and has been with the orphans and the street kids ever since. Her only break? An exhausting four-day return home to surprise her father, not to mention the rest of the Als organization by showing up at the Grey Cup Ring Ceremony.
She’ll be back in Montreal just before Christmas. Will the Grey Cup need to be stuffed into that same hockey bag and tramped around the city after a franchise-first Repeat? Only the football gods know for sure.
But Genevieve Harbec knows she’s already scored the greatest victory. It is written in the smiles of those children. It comes with being thankful for what you have and opening your heart to those who have the least, yet give the most.
