13th Busser Bonanza Recap

The festivities begin at 7:30 AM under the Busser bonanza banner at North Wood Park with pastries juice and coffee. No mingling game was necessary, as new faces were introduced and quickly got acquainted to the boisterous Busser clan. Unfortunately, only about half of the family were in attendance: Phyl, Phil, Mark, David, and Tyler Andersen; Cheryl and Paul Breen; don (DJ),  Jackie, Brian, Jaime, Garrett, Kayden, Chris, Stephanie, Kamryn (Kamy) and Trevor Gormley; Anitha and Kyle Vander Hill; Kelly, Trevor and Parker Unruh; Shirley, Wendy, and Tracie Crockett; Jon, Kathy, and Ryan Kapis; and extended family members included David’s fiancé Erick, and Tracy’s beau, Jeff; and Brenda and her husband, Mike. Even champ (John) showed up as Uber driver for Anitha and Kyle.  Alyssa and Holden Vander Hill arrived on Sunday.

Specially designed bonanza shirts, in blazoned with the main family names of Busser, Gormley, Andersen, Kapis, and Breen were distributed. Unfortunately there were many Bonanzians not in attendance, mostly due to work constraints or illness. Those among the missing were: Justin Breen; Norma, Sue, Daryl, Elizabeth, William, Brandon, Hunter, Kelly, Aaron, And CT kapis; John Perry, Megan (fractured foot), and baby John Crockett; Paul, Mical, Ken(Knee surgery), Linda, Jeffrey, KD, Madlyn, Benjamin, Nicholas, William, Andrew, Tim, Aileen, Scott, Vanessa, Christina, Kevin, Katlyn, Alisa, and Mateo Busser; lorey, Nathan, Rebecca, and Madeline Andersen; and Randy Vander Hill.

“B” and “C” teams were selected by random drawing by team captains, Brian and Chris Gormley. Everyone walked over to the beautifully manicured ballfield, with Abbot and Costello stand-up mascots overseeing the game, “who’s on first, what’s on second…”  The ceremonial first pitch was thrown by the eldest Busser female present, Phil Andersen, in place of Gram.  Since no male Bussers were present, Paul Breen held the protective metal shield bearing the title that papa carried, “Official Busser Bonanza Umpire”.  Teams were as follows (as Recollected by the historian, as often players switched positions):

Memorable game moments:
    . First up to bat was Anitha, and Garrett was her designated runner. She promptly hit the first pitch thrown, and due to force of habit from her high school softball playing days, she forgot about her DR and she immediately started to run towards first, stumbling in the gravel, and did a graceful header to begin the game. Fortunately, she incurred no serious injuries, only a bruised ego!
    . Anitha caught a pop fly as catcher, setting a standard that was hard to match!
    . Jeff made three superior catches in the outfield!
    . Garrett made a nice stab at a grounder in the infield!
    . Kyle hit a triple!
    . David hit a double!
    . Mark’s appearance at the bonanza this year was a real treat, as he was still recovering from lung cancer surgery a few weeks before; however, he did not let a few battle scars keep him from playing full on softball; hitting, catching and running the bases as if it were the World Series! Minor injuries: Phil got beaned on the forehead, and he proudly wore a monkey Band-Aid on his knee. Other skinned knees belonged to David and Mark who was also grazed on his belly by a line drive, and Jon pulled his hammie.  
Score ended at 10 all (due to time constraints).  since the score was tied, all players chanted “we are the champions” and threw their mitts and ball caps up in the air to celebrate! Neither team earned a winners trophy; instead the official ball thrower, Phyl, presented the trophies to the team captains, Brian and Chris, to Mark who traveled the furthest to attend, to Paul for his outstanding baseball commentary as the Ump, to Garrett for his excellent hitting and running, to Jackie who did an excellent job as scorekeeper, to Kayden for her cheerleading skills (who learned everything from Cheryl, “beat ’em, bust ’em, that’s our custom, ooh, ooh,”) to Kamy “just because”.

Rest and relaxation followed in the community center with cardplaying of “66” and “Dalmuti” and Phyl, Shirley, Jon and Cheryl indoctrinated newcomers, Garrett and Jackie, in a rousing sentimental favorite “Park – and – shop” game! The room was decorated with a family tree displaying the faces of Gram and Papa’s offspring, and mementos of the past. Photo cubes with the words “we are who we are because they were who they were) were scattered on the tables. Each cube contained black and white Kodak moments dating back to the late 1800s with the original Busser family, John (later known endearingly as “Grandpa One
Leg”) and Lucy Busser (Papa’s parents) as well as “Button’s mommy and daddy”, Walter and Sue Smith (Gram’s parents).  The cubes also showcased the developing years of the Busser siblings, JoAn, Norma, Paul, Phil, Tim, Ken, and Cheryl, from Amherst, Ohio and later years in San Mateo, California. There were a couple of 40 – year balloons celebrating the anniversary of the first Busser bonanza held in 1976.  Throughout the day, everyone enjoyed the delicious and nostalgic “orange cookies” lovingly baked by Anitha and Cheryl, and given Gram’s recipe card Christmas ornament keepsake.

Brian and Jamie were on the food committee, purchasing wonderful delicacies for all.  Don and Paul were the cooks of typical picnic fair of hamburgers, hot dogs, potato salad, chips, cookies and cupcakes for dessert. After lunch, everyone went over to the grassy field where we re-created the “amazing race” obstacle course of old, following Chris’s creative Minion instructions for all nine challenges including “dress and undress”, “over – under hurdles”, “balloon pop”, “water gun”, “spoonful of water”, “being bag toss”, “it’s in the hole golf”, “gutter balls”, and ending with “puzzled” which seemed to have been the most difficult task of all. Who would have thought that putting together a 24 piece puzzle would have been that difficult!  Ahhh, the pressure of the clock! Brian’s team Won and participants were awarded gold medals.

The traditional water balloon toss followed, with David and Eric out first. One step backward each round caused the majority of players to burst their balloons in the next 20 minutes, some with Flair as the spinning balloon toss to Paul orthe one-handed toss by Stephanie as she held Kamy in her arms, soaking poor Chris. The final two couples were Shirley and Ryan, and Brian and Jamie, with the latter becoming the 2016 champions!

A dinner of pizza and salad was served and afterwards the lights dimmed and the photo cube candles flickered as the room became a movie theater for the soul. Phyl, with the technical assistance of David, had painstakingly and lovingly created a heartwarming photo collage masterpiece of days gone by, set to music reminiscent of the particular era with tunes that fit each Busser.  “Rock me gently” played during pictures of Tim; “hey, hey, we’re the monkeys” was of course, Cheryl’s theme song; Elvis says “love me tender” for Gram; and Paul’s “the Gambler”.  Old movies of prior bonanzas followed and a special memorial section of those Bussers that are now with us only in spirit.

Sunday’s game party festivities took place at the Doubletree Hotel, giving people a chance to update on what’s been happening in their lives and reminisced over photo albums of Gram and Papa’s 60th anniversary, Papa’s memorial, and previous Busser bonanzas that were documented over the years by family historian, Norma. We read emails and stories from people who couldn’t attend, and wished they were there to share with us. No official game tournament occurred, as casual games of 66 and Dalmuti sprung up, and some took part in a new game introduced by Mark called codeword. The “Busser’s Got Talent” segment, unfortunately, did not take place either, for lack of talented Bussers.  My apologies again to Wendy who didn’t get a chance to showcase her musical talents on her bongo drums. She is currently in a band and I’m sure we missed a wonderful concert. We all look forward to hearing her perform at the next bonanza when hopefully we will have more Bussers present who can accompany her, like Scott Busser who is a wonderful guitarist.

The surprise of the day was when Cheryl received a text from Justin, who unfortunately could not attend the bonanza this year because he was a groomsman at his best friend’s wedding and was bartending at the Delmar racetrack’s closing weekend. He asked if Brian and Chris might like to place a bet on a horse named Gormley who was running later in the afternoon, in race #7 at 10:1 odds. The jockey was Victor Espinoza who is a recent triple crown winner, and he was wearing Irish green silks. Wow! A sure bet to bring this horse to the winners circle! Cheryl quickly collected a total of $110 from those that wished to partake in the gamble, and the consensus was to put all of the bet on Gormley horse #8 to win. Justin questioned our logic and asked if we would prefer to split the bet into $40 each for win, place, or show, giving us better odds if the horse didn’t come in the number one position. We held firm, all $110 on Gormley to win! Justin placed the bet at Del Mar and texted us a copy of which we hoped to be a “winning ticket”, whose odds dropped to 6 to 1 by the time the race began. We cajoled about how cool it would be if Gormley were to win, and laughingly thought about all the relatives in heaven that would be pushing that little horse’s ass over the finish line for us on this momentous occasion, led by Alice, Justin’s grandmother who was an avid horse aficionado. We all scrambled to find the race on our iPhones, iPads, or computers and decided to go to the hotel’s bar to watch it on a larger screen. Coincidentally, Brian received a text from one of his clients who said that he was at Del Mar and wanted Brian to know that a horse named Gormley was running. Brian laughed and said he already knew, that his cousin was bartending and gave us the tip and had already placed our bet! Babies in tow, we hustled over to the bar and asked the bartender to put on the race and turn it up so we could all hear. Needless to say, we caused quite a commotion when we all crowded into the bar gazing at the mounted TV. Other patrons asked what was going on and we explained about our family reunion and that our namesake horse was about to run, and they chimed in on the fun, hooting and hollering for good ol’ #8.  The horn blared, the gates opened, and they were off! We all watched with baited breath and eyes glued to the numbers at the bottom of the screen, as the horses and their numbers on their blankets were too difficult to see. #8 was jockeying between third and fourth from last place, even amidst our rambunctious cheers. But alas, the race was over, and #8 came in third from last. Disheartened, we all sadly started to head back to our meeting room, saying it was OK, it was only a $10 bet from each of us, like you would simply place on a lottery, not a big loss. When all of a sudden Brian yelled out, “hey, we won!” What?! Ha ha, funny joke Brian, we just saw #8 took third from last place. But his friend had texted that good ol’ #8 DID come in! At that moment, Justin texted us, too – it was true, Gormley had won the race, in fact, winning by about seven or eight lengths! The TV station had the wrong numbers displayed throughout the race so what we were watching was not correlating to the actual horses’ positions. So, in fact, we did win, all totaled about $845, of which Justin laid on the counter and texted us the photo of the $100 bills and change! Unbelievable! What were the odds of this happening! Justin claimed it was destiny that he couldn’t join us at the bonanza this year because he had to work – he was right where he was supposed to be… Being our bookie while we cheered Gormley to Victory!

The rest of the afternoon and evening was spent chatting and playing games as many of the bonanzians headed for home to what was a truly momentous reunion. Discussions ensued of whether we should make this an annual event, or every two years, and whether we should change the date to memorial weekend so that more Bonanzians could attend, and also change the venue to Northern California or somewhere in between like we did in the past when we went to Mammoth and Lake arrowhead. We will continue to keep the Busser bugle alive, and perhaps the website too, updating from time to time the happenings of the family. So share your stories and watch for your next vehicle! Volunteer to be on the planning committee. It is a lot of fun, and this committee is now passing the baton to the younger generation to keep the bonanza alive.  Start oiling up your gloves and polishing up your talents for the next bonanza! We can’t wait to see you.

Respectfully submitted by stand-in historian, Cheryl, on behalf of the Busser bonanza reunion planning committee, composed of Phyl, Brian, Chris, and Cheryl.