Wasn’t it just yesterday we were doing everything together? Skinning our knees on that back sidewalk by the BBQ. Shoveling snow into buckets and wheelbarrows as an “emergency water supply.” Playing nurse and doctor in our little “office” upstairs. Writing and performing plays. Burying birds that hit the window in a little graveyard in the corner of the garden. Digging drainage ditches in the field, from “The Big Lake” to “The Ruts.” Setting up “The Glaser Museum” in the old chicken house. Flying to Pennsylvania together. Playing Narnia with garbage can lid shields and homemade wooden swords (I was Lucy, he was Peter). Making our own wood stain out of walnut husks. Spending countless hours building and defending the “G&W” fort or “The Secret Tunnel.” Playing World War II–first I was a nurse and he was PFC Bill Glaser, then we built an airplane in the apple tree and were pilots. Year after year of hunting together (I always got the easy shots–he had to work hard for his shots and take care of what I got).

We even did our school work together at the kitchen table, until Will’s perpetual tongue-clicking noises (if law doesn’t work out, it’s possible this talent could lead to something, perhaps in the sound effects department?) drove me to a desk in my room. We discovered we could be much better friends if we did our school work separately. Then there was the Faith Summer Drama Troupe–we played boyfriend and girlfriend so convincingly that first year in “There’s a Carnival on 8th Street” that some of our friends couldn’t believe we were really brother and sister, we got along so well.

Freckle faced, with matching red hair (from the same bottle of dye, as we joked) many people thought we were twins. Two years, two months apart, we were the same height for much of our growing up years (until Will passed me up at about age 11!). From then on, everyone just assumed Will was older than I. And for the record, there was even a time when I could beat him arm wrestling.

But Will quickly passed me up in brains and in brawn. I watched in amazement as my little brother soared past six feet tall and retained more historical facts than I had ever learned. Then we heard about TeenPact. At fifteen, Will was scared stiff to go. But I filled out his application for him, forced him to write his testimony to go with it, and put it in the mail. (Click here for the whole story.) I had no interest in politics, so I had no thought of going with him.

Little did I know how much our paths would thus diverge. I proudly came to each of his TeenPact graduations. I cooked for his TeenPact friends. There wasn’t an Oregon TeenPact class I missed visiting while I lived at home. But his TeenPact travels took him all across the country. Other girls were part of his daily life. He had inside jokes with other people. They were always kind enough to make me feel included as an “honorary TeenPacter” and give me reports on my little brother. But it just wasn’t the same. My little brother was growing up. And I couldn’t have been more proud.

I was his “press secretary” who wrote to the local newspapers when he placed second in the nation with the American Legion Oratorical Contest in 2003, and ninth nationally in the Veterans of Foreign Wars “Voice of Democracy” Audio Essay Contest in 2004. I even entered his political world a bit when he introduced me to a state legislator whom I ended up working for two legislative sessions. I proudly sat there on the side of the Oregon House of Representatives as Rep. Jeff Kropf introduced his aide, my brother, saying, “I’m very proud of this young man. You keep your eye on him because he will be back.”

I gladly helped on Will’s very first campaign, when he ran for TeenPact President in 2003. I got to be there for the ’04 TeenPact National Convention, as he shook hands with the next TeenPact Vice President, that short, sweet Southern girl with beautiful long hair (who he’s now courting).

We took our SAT’s together. We took college writing classes together. We worked at the Capitol together. Then once again, he was off–and the college campus and capitol hallways were lonely without my brother. On a trip back east I got to see my brother in his new world, during his first year at Patrick Henry College. I watched the videos of his school dramas, longing for the old days of being in drama troupe together. I told him I was going to quit praying for the tests he was so worried about when he always got an A. And I wasn’t surprised when he was first elected Student Body Vice President, then Student Body President, and placed second in a national Moot Court tournament. And of course, head of the campus security force (“the guy with three cell phones”) was a natural–at six-foot-five, he’d been my body guard for years.

He was one of the first I called when I was engaged (my very bright little brother took a long time to figure out a phone call from his sister, on Valentine’s Day, stating she was out to eat with her fiance). He was one of the first I called when I found out I was expecting (he was quicker to catch on to the words “niece or nephew”). Now he’s graduating from college. And headed to law school. I guess we’re growing up.

Congratulations, little brother. I love you lots and I am so very proud of you.