A Nightly Serenade

The following post was contributed by Jennifer Brewington, a friend of J.B.'s from Camp Elim (a Christian camp where he volunteered for several summers during High School):

One week during the summer, years ago (I want to say 7 years), J.B. was the guy's counselor for Co-Workers camp. Since it was such a small group, there was just one building that the boys and girls used, with only a wall and a door separating their sleeping quarters. Well, every night J.B. would get all the boys into the small hallway on the other side of the door to sing to the girls right before bed. Every night we looked forward to what song it would be, sometimes we would make requests, but we all thought it was great!

Happy Birthday J.B.!

Today, January 9th, would have been J.B.'s 26th Birthday. He missed it by just over 3 weeks. On his last birthday I told him "Let me know how this whole quarter of a century thing turns out and I might give it a try in . . . um about a year and a half or so. Love ya!"

I really wish he was still around to give me his advise! However, these past three weeks without him have been so enlightening, and inspirational that I feel like he has left it behind for me to continue to digest through the kind words of his friends, co-workers, family, classmates, teammates, roommates, and teachers . . . so to all of you I say THANK YOU!

If God grants me the gift of 17 more months on this earth I will, for what feels like the first time in my life, have accomplished something that my big brother was not able to do . . . reach my 26th Birthday. If that happens, I may surpass him in age but I know for sure that it will take a lifetime to try to outlive him.

Happy Birthday Brother! I LOVE YOU LIKE CRAZY!

P.S. I think that it is worth noting that Apple Computers just unveiled their new products today, January 9th! Coincidence . . . I think not. Despite what gifts we may have given him this birthday I think that he would still consider this little piece of information the best thing EVER! More to come on that later.

J.B. with friends from D'Evelyn High School on his 18th Birthday

Jamin celebrating his 25th Birthday on base last year - thank you to all who made this a special day for him!

The Perfect Weekend - In His Own Words

Being the tight-knit though somewhat spread out family that we are, we have always loved receiving emails from eachother. There has kind of been this energy generated in our household whenever we receive emails from members that are not currently at home. Its almost a contest to see who can report that they saw the email first "Did you see the email from ________ yet?" And then recounting everything that the family member said before the other person has a chance to read it for themselves. It is with this excitement that we always read through Jamin's emails about his adventures at college and then in Europe. Yes, he went some amazing places and saw some of the most extraoridinary landscapes. However, it never ceased to amaze us how excited he could get about the most mundane things in life. He saw the good in everything. The email below is simply an example of that. I hope you enjoy reading about life from Jamin's perspective. We could all learn a lesson or two about positivity from this:

"Today I woke up and went to a friend's house for brunch. It was four lawyers, a nurse, and me, and we had eggs, bacon, sausage, biscuits with home-made peach preserves, Nutella, and raspberry jam, mimosas, and lots of tasty fruit. Quite a spread, really. And I must tell you that these lawyer-types are really quite well-educated, and hence, quite witty. Lots of fun for breakfast conversation.

Meanwhile, I recieved a call from another friend who wondered if I'd like to go on a bike ride. Now you see, I've been going on some little bike rides here and there, but I've been meaning to go on a really serious bike ride for a while now, and this was it. The friends I was meeting up with actually live a decent bit (by bike, at least) away from me, and then from there we were going to a cool little town on the Mosel River. Well, it ended up being quite a trek. I biked 43 km each way over some pretty serious hills, for a total of 86 km today. I think if I had been in the Tour de France, I would have gotten the red spotted jersey today for best hill-climbing (I guess I _was_ the only one who rode the hilly parts of the trail, but you know...). Anyhow, awesome time. Had a tasty little waffle with whipped cream and cherries in Bernkastel (the destination) for a mid-ride treat, then hopped back on the trail to head home. Total time on bike today: 6.5 hours. Awesome.

And then I came home and had some tasty spaghetti*. And now I am going to bed. And I like bed.

Oh yes, and I wrote an e-mail to my family whom I love very much. That's great. I can't wait to get to see you all at Thanksgiving. Hope you all had a great weekend too.

Love you like crazy,
Jamin

* Well, not quite as tasty as Mom's, but hey -- a guy can't ask for
_everything_, can he?"

Boston Memorial Service

The Boston Memorial Service will be held Sunday, January 14th at 5:00pm.
The location is: Memorial Chapel
Harvard Yard
Cambridge, MA
Following the service there will be a reception at Adams House.

Jamin's Important Research

This post was contributed by Felix Blum a dear friend of the family who entered my Dad's life when he lived with his family during high school on an exchange program from Switzerland. Since that time we have been in touch several times a year and he has had multiple opportunities to spend time with our family and us with his.

Forty years ago I came into the Wilson family. Since I arrived in Denver in 1966 we have shared some important steps in our lives: Charlie and Becky got married the same year als Susanne and I did. What a wonderful surprise and joy, when we could announce to each other at the same time the birth of our first children - Jamin and Anna. This way it went on. Every other year we were given one more couple. First Molly and Basil, then Parker and Rosalia and finally Brynna and Donat. The only difference (beside that each one is a very unique idividual) was, that you started with a boy and ended with a girl while we did it vice versa.
In 1999 your whole family come over to Europe and visited us in Switzerland. The following year we all were together on Lake Powell and in Denver - unforgettable times for us!

Having the chance to see four children growing, up one certainly can notice some caracteristics according to the position in their familiy. E.g. our eldest, Anna, is a person that tries to do everything to her best and who takes lots of responsability. I believe to have noticed a similar attitude with J.B. On the pictures taken at the Rhine Falls and on Lake Powell Jamin stands firm and responsable in this life.The third picture has been taken in Arogno. From that trip to the italian part of Switzerland I still remember a little story:

We just got home from lunch in Como on the Italian side of the border when Jamin announced that he needs to go to the nearest McDonalds. So we got back in the car and drove to Lugano. As I did not know better we got off in front of a Burger King restaurant. It was only there that I realized that we were not looking just for a hamburger to eat because Jamin would prefer American to Italian food or because he was still hungry. No, what he was looking for was a Mc Donalds place because his aim was to test weather the quality of the Big Mac is the same all over the world. For that he wanted to taste one of them in every bigger city he passed on his trip through Europe. Of course we wanted to give our support to his studies that he followed systematically even during vacations. So we were really glad when we finally pulled in in front of a real Mc Donald's. And Jamin was pleased with the results of his researches.