Christy Clugston: Hi. This is Christy with Inspire HeART Incorporated. I'm the Director of Inspire HeART. And today, I'm just going to share a little bit about the sculpture that I did that is now located in the Healing Gardens at San Juan Regional Medical Center. And it's a really cool story how I did this.

So, originally, I was going to make an art piece for the New Mexico Art in Public Places, and I was trying to think of ideas and what I wanted to do. And we live up in an area where I have a couple acres. And one day I was outside and I was cleaning my yard outside, and I noticed like around my fence line, there was just all this broken glass. And I started picking it up and putting it in a bucket. It was a lot of older glass. There was like some really pretty green bottles. But then, I started noticing that some of it was a lot of old beer bottles and different things, but the glass itself was really pretty. I didn't really think anything of it. I just started putting all this glass in like a big bucket, and I kind of set it to the side. The second day I went out there and I was looking at it and it was really early in the morning because it was getting pretty hot so I tried to go pick up stuff early in the morning. And as I was picking it up, I noticed the glass was shimmering and it looked just really beautiful and I was just staring at it almost in awe a little bit of like, "Huh, it looks so pretty, I wonder if I can make something out of these glass pieces."

So, after thinking of what could I make that would be a sculpture that I could use glass, I remembered a time that was a few years ago where my father had been flown to Colorado Springs because he'd had an unexpected heart attack. And as he was there, and we were staying, I remember that the hospital had these. They weren't like super big-- but they have these beautiful little sculptures of butterflies. And I loved looking at them. So whenever I would get a little overwhelmed being in the hospital or trying not to worry too much, I remember I'd go out and I'd sit by those butterflies and how comforting it was to me. And I just thought it was amazing. So, I started thinking and I was like, "I wonder if I can make a really huge butterfly and decorate it with paint and glass." But then I was like, "How in the world am I going to make something--" because I wanted it huge. And I thought, "Well, if I'm going to enter anything in the New Mexico art thing, this would be something cool that someone would want."

So, I called my dad and I said, "Would you help me make a huge metal butterfly that would be stable enough that it would not get tore down or it would be resistant to all weather?" And my dad's like, "Yeah, come on over. Let's do this." And my dad's a welder by trade. He's retired now, but he's that kind of guy that can make absolutely anything out of nothing. So, he came over and he had these huge sheets of metal. I think each wing, weighed like over 50 pounds. And he's like, "Let's do this. Draw what you want each wing to look like," and we put it together. And I remember just watching him, just how careful he was. And, you know, if you ever watch somebody weld, like they get sparks all over them and it's kind of painful, but he was just grinning the whole time and just happy because he was helping me make something. We finished and I took it home and then I began to paint on it.

And what I did with those glass bottles is I started pulling them so much and I separated them into colors. And I, in the garage, started putting them in bags and busting up all the glass and putting them in sections. And one reason that I picked the butterfly was because butterflies, they symbolize transformation. They symbolize rebirth, renewal. And I just wanted something that would make people know that no matter what your situation is, that you can come out of something on the other side and be better for it. We may be changed, but we can always grow from things.

So, the next thing I did was, after I had spent lots of hours putting this butterfly together and my husband helped me epoxy it, and we finished it all and it looked beautiful, well, I put it on the New Mexico arts thing and it had been on for a little bit, but somebody outside called me and they made an offer for this butterfly. And I said no, because they wanted it to go to Santa Fe, and it was a really great thing. But I was like, "I don't want it to go there." So, I just kept it in the garage. And I took it off of that website, because I was like, this is not where I want the butterfly to go.

So, I just kind of waited, and we had a friend that was at the hospital for quite a while at San Juan Regional Medical Center. And I remember I was going down there a lot, and walking by. And I've always loved the Healing Gardens at the hospital, I thought it was beautiful. And I remember I just kept seeing over and over. I could visually see that butterfly going there, that it was supposed to be there. And I'm a person that, by profession, I do art with students for just mental wellness stuff in the schools. And I do stuff like that, but I also, because of my journey with that, I've become an artist myself. Well, I think everybody can be an artist, but as much of an artist as one can be. So, I've started creating and doing more stuff, but I just kept thinking like, "Man, that butterfly would be so beautiful there." So, I ended up reaching out to Roberta at the hospital. And I said, "I want to donate the butterfly to San Juan Regional Medical Center, I want the butterfly to stay here in Farmington. I don't want it to go to a different part of the state. I want to be able to have generations to be able to enjoy this." Because one thing I've noticed with art is you can get paid a lot for something. But eventually, you're going to go through that money, and it might be great for a moment. But when you make something really cool, there's so much more value and worth if it can stay somewhere that everybody's going to be able to see. Like, I love to be able to see if artwork can bless other people.

But the thing about this butterfly is even though I came up with the idea and I might've broken the glass and I painted it, I had other people that helped me through all of this. It was not a one-man project. I couldn't have done it if my dad wouldn't have welded and made the base of the butterfly. I couldn't have done it if my husband wouldn't have helped me epoxy it. I couldn't have done it if Roberta wouldn't have been willing to help me to be able to get ahold of Ruth and have Ruth come over and show her. And actually, Roberta helped come up with the name. And it was just really cool. So when Ruth came over to the house and came and looked at the butterfly, she said, "Where do you want it?" And I just knew that it was all going to work out. I knew where I saw that it was going to be every time I walked by it. But I just felt like, "You know what? Don't say anything, because Ruth's going to figure out where it needs to go." And she had tossed up a couple ideas of different things of where it needed to go. And she called me and she goes, "I have a perfect place." She goes, "It's supposed to go in the Healing Gardens. And what do you think of that?" I'm like, "That's exactly where it's supposed to go." And Roberta called me and said, "Hey, do you have a name for it?" And I was like, "No, but you have a name for it." So, it's not just a one person thing. Even the gentleman that helped us set up the butterfly, him and his team, the people that do the maintenance, I couldn't have done it without them setting it up and welding it and securing it all together. So, I don't feel like it was ever just my piece.

But a couple of things that I really took away from this whole process is one that we can do so much more if we all work together. We're meant to lift each other up and help each other. And I've always had a motto that the most healing thing you can ever do is to serve others without expecting anything in return. And I really live by that. And there's no money, there's nothing on earth that can be more precious and actually more fulfilling than serving others. That's what I believe too one reason why the butterfly was supposed to go to San Juan Regional Medical Center was because the people that work there, every single person, there's not one part of the hospital where somebody doesn't do something like gears to help everything move smoothly.

And it really is a selfless job. I mean, they're loving people and serving people in some of their hardest times in their life. And I just think that there's nothing more amazing than that to live like that, to just love others and serve others. So, I just wanted to be able to share that and the fact that the butterfly is going to be at the hospital for a really long time is just absolutely amazing to me. And I never felt like it was mine, anyways, like all mine. I always felt like it was just different people contributing to, and also coming together to make something beautiful. And I just think that all humans, we're all inherently designed for community. We're made to collaborate, support each other. We're made to lift up each other. I just love that there's such healing power in doing that.

And the biggest takeaway that I always get every time I see something great like this come together is that it just makes you realize, one, that we live in such a great community. We really do. We're surrounded by so many amazing and loving people and so many creative people.

So, I just hope that the butterfly, my main thing was that it just helps encourage others, and it'll encourage them to just love others as well. So, I think that would probably sum up everything about the butterfly. Part of it is that broken glass. It really represents that so often, if you see broken glass, you want to throw it away, but you can actually take those broken pieces and put it together and make something even more beautiful. I imagine the manufacturers that made those bottles, they weren't thinking that someday this is going to be part of a huge butterfly, but I believe anything that might feel broken or just not fixable can always have the potential to be something even more beautiful.

So, I just am so grateful for the for them allowing me to, have the butterfly that be its permanent home. And I also think everybody that does so much at San Juan Regional Medical Center, like how much they do for our community. So, I just want to thank everybody for coming and listening, and I'm just wishing everybody a wonderful and inspiring day. Thank you so much.