Patty Morris comes from a tennis-rich family, as all five of Patty and John's children played tennis at a competitive level growing up in Jefferson City. The highest level was reached by the second-oldest child, Dave, who made a career of it --- he was the tennis professional for more than 30 years at at the prestigious Bellerive Country Club in St. Louis.

(Bellerive is best known for its other sport, golf, as was it will host the last of this year's four major championships, the PGA, next week.)

Patty found out the news, the news of this trip of a lifetime, from the Morris' oldest child, Sarah, in June.

"She said, 'Mother, we have a surprise for you, but I'm not supposed to tell,'" Patty recalled with a smile. "Well, she can't keep a secret and about the next sentence she said, 'I'm just going to tell you --- little John has tickets for the men's finals at Wimbledon, and you are to go with him.'"

Little John is John Wright, 42, who's Sarah's son, Patty's grandson, a highly-successful investor, and a former Missouri State Representative from the 47th District in the Columbia area.

You can imagine Patty's reaction when she heard the news.

"I couldn't believe it," she said. "I'm sitting here now and wondering, Did I really go over there? Since all of our kids played tennis, Wimbledon is kind of a holy thing to us. We've watched it ever since Sarah started playing."

That would span more than five decades.

This would be considered either a really late birthday present or a really early one --- Patty's birthday is actually in December. And being a birthday present wasn't Wright's original intent.

In any case --- and besides making the rest of the family look really frugal --- what a gift.

"It's something I've been thinking about doing for a while," Wright said, “and a couple of months ago I decided to make it happen. In all these years of watching Wimbledon on TV, my grandmother never had the opportunity to be over there and experience it.

"We have a very close family and she's our No. 1 tennis fan. One of my earliest memories, I was a really little kid, was watching John McEnroe and Bjorn Borg at Wimbledon with my grandmother on a little television set in her family room in Jefferson City.

"And the first tennis racket I ever hit with was a wooden racket that belonged to her – it must have weighed about thirty pounds. We both love tennis and, for tennis fans, Center Court at Wimbledon is kind of sacred ground. It's the same court we watched Borg and McEnroe play on through that little TV screen nearly forty years ago.

"So this was very special for both of us."

Indeed.

"I was absolutely blown away by Wimbledon," Patty said. "It's a huge place --- that stadium is enormous and it was packed.

"It was just so wonderful to see it in person. The balls pop, they really make a sound that you don't get on TV. And the people there don't make a sound while they're playing, it's not like the U.S. Open."

For the record, Novak Dokovic defeated Kevin Anderson 6-2, 6-2, 7-6. But Patty got so much more out of this experience.

"Wimbledon is so manicured with beautiful flowers everywhere," she said. "And we were so impressed with the ball boys and girls, they're just always at the ready with towels, with tennis balls, holding umbrellas over the players ... they were really fun to watch. They never missed a step.

"Of course, when I got in there, I immediately wanted to see what Royals were there, and we saw the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge (Kate and Prince William). Well, there's a color yellow and there's a color yellow that she had on. I mean, I've never see a more beautiful yellow, she was like a spotlight down on that end of the court.

"Everybody else just looked washed out."

And the food staple of Wimbledon, strawberries and cream?

"They were," Patty said, "fabulous."

This trip was much more than just one tennis match, because "London is just so interesting." Other memories included:

^ Seeing a performance of the King and I;

^ A visit to Westminster Abbey, where the ashes of theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking were interred between the graves of Charles Darwin and Sir Isaac Newton during services just three weeks prior;

The company you keep, right?

^ Seeing St. Martin's Chapel, where Winston Churchill is buried;

^ And a trip to St. Paul's Cathedral, where Prince Charles and Lady Diana were married. "There's something about St. Paul's," Patty said, "that just takes my breath away.

"All in all, it was just a fabulous experience, I couldn't ask for anything better."

What a trip, what a gift --- just as Patty has been for everyone she's touched. If you know her, you know.

63 inches of pure gold

"She's very, very special," Wright said. "She's just a person who's full of love. She has five kids and nine grandkids, and all of us have grown up with her unconditional love and support. She makes each of us feel special."

Happy Birthday, grandma.

Loeffler's Link

Patty Morris receives surprise
trip to London, Wimbledon finals

John Wright poses with his grandmother, Patty Morris, prior to the men's Wimbledon final last month in London.