WAL­TER AL­IBEY

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

wal­ter.al­ibey@guardian.co.tt

Col­in “Creepy” Wil­son’s body was tak­en through an av­enue of lift­ed bike wheels at his fu­ner­al ser­vice at the Church of As­sump­tion on Mar­aval Road, Port-of-Spain yes­ter­day.

His cof­fin was car­ried by present and past col­leagues of the Geron­i­mo’s Bike Shop where he worked, and de­spite the anger that con­sumed the cy­cling and oth­er sport­ing fra­ter­ni­ties when he died in a crash at Skin­ner Park, San Fer­nan­do, on Good Fri­day, for the first time since, a unit­ed force filled the church, with all pledg­ing their sup­port to Wil­son’s fam­i­ly mem­bers- Tr­isha Wil­son, his wife, his three sons An­tho­ny, Aadon and Akeem Wil­son, and al­so his moth­er Maria Louise Wil­son, whose be­lief in the Almighty God en­abled her to en­joy the sad but cel­e­bra­to­ry mood of her son’s life.

Eu­lo­gised as a ser­vant leader by Gevan Samuel, the son of cy­cling icon Gene ‘Geron­i­mo’ Samuels, the own­er of Geron­i­mo’s Bike Shop, along­side the large con­gre­ga­tion, which fea­tured a cross-sec­tion of sport­ing per­son­al­i­ties, was tak­en through Wil­son’s life.

The ju­nior Samuel, as though in a con­ver­sa­tion with his friend and col­league, said, “There are mul­ti­tudes of us stand­ing here who have known you for years, all of whom can at­test to your gen­uine will­ing­ness to as­sist, to pro­tect and to labour for oth­ers. Dis­play­ing and lead­ing through true civ­il good, they may walk up, know­ing you for much short­er pe­ri­ods of time, yet you con­tin­ue to de­posit last­ing im­pres­sions in­to their lives.”

“Col­in, your life has a pur­pose. Your life is a tes­ti­mo­ny of sim­ple hu­mil­i­ty, demon­strat­ing what they call the true heart of a man. One who stands in the guard of oth­ers. When you get to put oth­ers in or­der for them to fly high. One who abol­ished the pur­pose in their ca­pac­i­ty, to car­ry a heavy load on an­oth­er’s shoul­der. One who stands root­ed in loy­al­ty, of servi­tude, a war­rior, and a pro­tec­tor,” Samuel said.

Wil­son’s eight-year-old son Akeem de­liv­ered a trib­ute in song, as part of the pro­ceed­ings.

His wife and moth­er were ful­ly at his side in a show of sup­port, while ‘Geron­i­mo’ Samuel and Eli­jah Greene, two ex-cy­clists, wept open­ly. Greene was re­mem­bered as the man who ac­com­pa­nied Wil­son to the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal on that fate­ful night, but yes­ter­day he had the task of lift­ing him­self through­out the fu­ner­al for his fall­en friend.

T&F Cy­cling Fed­er­a­tion pres­i­dent Rowe­na and oth­er mem­bers of the fed­er­a­tion sat solemn­ly, while across the mourn­ing con­gre­ga­tion fea­tured sup­port­ers draped in jer­seys dis­play­ing Wil­son’s face.

Fa­ther Leslie Tang Kai said Wil­son’s life was con­fir­ma­tion that there are still Christ-like peo­ple. “We live among peo­ple who are so self-cen­tred that they’ll do any­thing to in­jure you, be­cause of jeal­ousy, be­cause of greed, and when you can find a per­son, and you can find them on the right path, then you know that there must be a God.”