“GOTTA love ya and leave ya”. Just one of many of Crowy’s quotable quotes.
“She’ll be right”, “computers are a passing fad” and “let’s go and get wet” are a few more that resonated with laughter and tears as family and friends farewelled Bryce Crow at the Yarra Valley Racing Centre on 13 November.
Bryce’s death from cancer at just 46 years of age hit those who loved him hard.
And, as someone who was born, grew up, worked, owned businesses and raised his family in the town, he was known, loved and liked by many.
The eldest of Jim and Jan Crow’s two boys, he was born at Healesville Hospital on 19 January 1968.
Four years later, Ashley completed the tight-knight Crow family.
Bryce went to Healesville Primary School and Lilydale Tech.
School didn’t suit him much – or he didn’t suit it.
After leaving he worked as an apprentice mechanic before starting Crows Transport business.
In 2005 he and wife Catherine bought Healesville Stockfeeds.
They were pursuits that put him in daily contact with hundreds of ‘locals’ – and he loved it.
With the unique insights and a degree of loving disrespect that only a younger brother can bring, Ashley delivered a moving and amusing tribute as he shared a lifetime of anecdotes supporting his opening comment … “Bryce loved life”.
“He was an incredible bloke, fun-loving, funny, a sh**-stirrer, humble, not very politically correct, but a very genuine, no fuss, don’t take yourself too seriously, she’ll be right type of bloke,” he said.
He loved the outdoors, was a member of the Black Spur 4WD Club and, following in his dad’s footsteps, was a volunteer with Healesville CFA.
Spending time with family and friends was his passion and his priority from holidays up at Bonnie Doon when he was growing up, water skiing and four-wheel driving in the bush as a young man and later with his own family, Catherine, son Mitchell and daughter Georgia.
“His weekends were always booked well in advance and if he wasn’t away up the (Eildon) weir he was up the bush, down at Bairnsdale or Lochsport, up at Tamworth, Bathurst, a truck or car show somewhere, at a ute muster, or going to see his favourite band Ruckus or some other social event somewhere; he just never stopped,” Ashley said.
There were stories of sibling rivalry and the scars that prove it, of “parties that never happened” while mum and dad were grey-nomading in the early ’90s, the inevitable motoring mishaps, the trip to Bali and the shock of discovering that the 24 hour pool bar didn’t stock VB.
“Have you ever seen anybody try and storm out of a pool bar? – pretty funny,” Ashley recalled, adding that Bali may just have been a bit too big a jump from the comfort zone of the Yarra Valley at that stage of Bryce’s life.
The biggest turning point in his life came when he met Catherine.
“It was the greatest thing that could have ever happened to him,” Ashley said.
He was ribbed mercilessly after sharing his frog and princess analogy with Ashley and other mates, but no-one had any doubts that they would be forever true soul-mates.
They shared a love of entertaining and just being around family and friends, but he also enjoyed quieter times with weekends away in the city with Catherine or long weekend breaks with just his family.
He was a loving dad, and a fun dad, to Mitch who was born in 1999, and Georgia born in 2001.
A video made by Georgia for Father’s Day last year and played during the service was a poignant and beautiful expression of the love he gave and got as a dad.
He was enormously proud of his kids.
After being diagnosed in 2007 with cancer, he and Catherine ensured that every opportunity was taken to make memories for the future – whatever that was to be.
The contribution Bryce made to the Healesville community was not complicated, or grand.
He was an astute and ethical businessman whose smile and helpful approach to customers was a genuine reflection of who he was. He was lovely to deal with.
He was a good friend whose quick wit and unique sense of humour could make someone’s day, but which was also backed up with a genuine concern for the happiness and wellbeing of the people who made up his many and diverse friendships.
Bryce passed away on 7 November 2014 following recurrent diagnosis of cancer.
He got to say goodbye in a phone message played at the service, to request that his ashes be sprinkled under the Bonnie Doon Bridge by a nude skier (do-able according to Ashley) and for 4XXXX beer to be served at his wake.
“He didn’t want everybody else to enjoy themselves too much if he wasn’t here to join in,” Ashley said.
That, however, was never going to happen – overruled in the name of good taste!
There was a standing ovation from the 700-strong gathering as Mitchell and Georgia took their dad on a final lap of honour in his beloved little green Morris Minor; a lump of firewood in the back and his favourite old hat on the coffin.
Bryce Leonard Crow will be sadly missed by his family, friends and the Healesville community.
– KATH GANNAWAY
