- Image by yoppy via Flickr
My wife got me four beautiful lowball (Old Fashioned) glasses yesterday. They have spiral lines and large circle patterns that match our wine glasses perfectly. It was a conscious attempt to bring my love for an occasional scotch into the fold. It makes it more acceptable to pass out drinks if you feel as though you aren’t just picking glassware out of the back of the cupboard. If there is some theme, some design to the glasses, it makes it feel as though you are purposeful, as if you aren’t trying to hide what you are drinking. And I most definitely am not.
It has taken me years to finally find something that is worthy of drinking slowly and pondering with others. It has taken me just as long to finally appreciate the complexity of alcohol and a disinterest with feeling the affects of it. I would rather feel the heavy based glass in my hand and hear the good conversation around me than stumble up the stairs at the end of the night. So, sometimes I use these glasses for egg nog. Sometimes they are for a little bit of orange juice. Sometimes, the Old Fashioned glasses are the perfect amount of water to soothe my palette.
It is the heavy base that makes it for me. You know that it isn’t going anywhere and that no child passing by is going to knock it over. You know as you hold it in your hand that the words you say are extra weighty and you choose them with purpose. You use the glass as a part of your gestures because it makes your point all the more. The heavy base makes the most satisfying sound as it hits the table for the last time and the ice settles against the side of the glass. The clink of putting your glasses together to toast a friend is even more pronounced because of how comfortable it is in your hand. It isn’t overgrown or awkward as a Tom Collins or wine glass can be. You don’t have to make up new ways to hold it as you might a snifter. There is a but a single comforting way of gripping a lowball and it feels like returning home every time that you do.
This small but undeniable comfort is overly sentimental. It is taking an inanimate object and placing emotions on top of it that are clearly more meaningful to me because of the experiences I have had while the glass is in my hand. I have found deeper friends and started new endeavors. I have thought about my future and wrestled with my past. They are inconsequential for everyone else in the room, but for me they are essential.
These glasses are the prop that I would like to use to advance the plot of my story. It isn’t what is in them that matters. It is their use that beckons the story forward. They are the ones begging the question, “What’s next?” They are the ones giving courage to tackle the conversations that we must have. Not because they are magical, but because they are mine.
My wife gave me glasses yesterday. Today, I thank her for all of the conversations I will have with them.
