Operation: Glass Etching

Written, Sunday, March 19, 2017

What a blessed weekend. My heart is full. As I sit here, the sun finally shining on this mid-March day, reflecting on the past twenty-four hours I know how blessed I am. BJ's passing has brought about many new friendships; deep friendships and they have one root, one common connection…BJ. His sweet, sweet girlfriend and his sweet, sweet sister-friend spent the weekend with me. We "grazed" on good-eats, we drank wine, and we etched the Willy emblem on FOUR DOZEN wine glasses and beer glasses!  

It all began about six months ago when BJ and Teri came to visit for the weekend; my birthday weekend. A couple of weeks prior to that he had posted a picture of a coffee/wine rack on Kristi's Facebook page. I fell in love with it. When he was here I showed him the picture of it and told him I was going to make myself one and how I would do it.  With excitement, he said, "yea…I'm going to make one for Kristi for Christmas". As I replied, "cool"! Teri nudged him saying, "you should make one for your mom too". He just smiled that BJ smile! BJ died a month later. Going into the holidays after the loss of my son was nearly unbearable, but I had to. I couldn't just cancel the holidays, I couldn't cancel life; I wasn't allowed to do that. I still have so much to live for, so many blessings that I call family. I had to find a way to not only keep going, but to move through the holidays, and find joy in the holidays. I decided I was going to honor his memory by making the wine rack for his sister-friend. She was suffering, she missed her "brother", and some days it was unbearable for her. I could hear it in her "posts". I wasn't quite sure how to do one part of the rack so I shared my plan with Bryan and Josie…and ultimately enlisted his help. I had until January 7 to complete it; we were going to a White Elephant party at Chuck and Kristi's and that would be my gift to her.  

As I was finalizing plans to finish this project, I had a "light bulb moment". We all have them. You know, the moment you get that great idea and it pops in your head like the turning on of a light bulb! I decided I would etch the "W" of the Willy emblem on the wine glasses, in his honor. When they hang upside down on the rack the W is an M for McCormick. YES…this is perfect!  And so the glass etching of the Willy emblem was born! I did present her with the gift from Heaven, from BJ, completed by his mom and brother. She loved it, she teared up, and she grabbed the glass and filled it with wine! 

I could see how much Bryan loved the etching and I know how much he loves and misses his big brother. I was doing things for others, but I wanted to do something special for him. Something so special that he would know…mom did THIS for me because she loves ME so much. I do, I love Bryan so much. I love them all so much. Bryan was my baby for nearly twenty years (until God blessed our family with his little brother), twenty years that he was mama's boy, my baby. Once he was no longer "the baby" he loved to joke that he was the neglected "middle child". He never was a "middle child" to me…he was the baby of my oldest two and now I want to do something special for him.  He drinks whiskey. I wanted to etch a special whiskey glass. Not just any whiskey glass. I wanted a crystal glass for my baby; he deserved the best. I etched the Willy emblem, in his brothers memory, on a pair of crystal whiskey glasses. They are special to him; for many reasons…he thinks of his big brother every time he sees the W and he knows his mom loves him so much; so much that she did this special thing JUST FOR HIM.  He posted a picture of them on Facebook. Then the requests began…where is my glass? That is awesome, we should do beer glasses for the guys. When do I get my wine glass?  

This weekend I was overjoyed to spend time with "BJ's Girls" etching "W"ine and beer glasses. We etched four dozen glasses in al! Glasses we will give to family, to friends, to loved ones. They too are special. They had a special relationship with BJ…because they had a relationship with BJ.