For my wife...

Tonight I was thumbing through my paper journal and found a couple of entries I wrote before I got married:

So here I am, somehow I finally feel some sense of home. The thing is, it's not a geographic location. It's not my apartment, where I grew up, or any of the places I've lived. Home is where it finally just feels right. It's not where I lay my head at night, it's not the place where I eat my meals. Home to me is who I come home to, it's the sum of my experiences with her-- the inside jokes, the smiles, the laughter, the shared tears, all the points in between the highest highs and the lowest lows.

Home is where life feels complete, where everything feels right with the world. Home is in her smile, her laugh, the way she knows me like no other. Home is the way she curls up in my arms on cold winter's day.

But what it all comes down to-- all the experiences we share-- it's not any one thing about her. It's the sum of her parts-- the sum of OUR parts-- all the experiences we've shared, all the experiences we're yet to share.

Home is, in a word, "us."

And a few months later:

In my heart lie all the words that describe my feelings for you. And no matter how much I say, no matter how much I write those words will never be spoken nor written.

They are too deep, too far down-- buried so deep inside me that they shall never escape. Some, most, if not all of those words don't exist yet, they may never.

They are the blueprints of all I feel for you. Every thought, dream, wish, just waiting to be imagined into existence.

You are the muse behind every word I write or ever will write-- you are the inspiration forming my feelings-- my being-- the sum of all that I am into something far greater than I ever imagined.

I give you all of me because it's already yours. I give you every smile, laugh, nod, kiss, hug-- I give you all of it.

I give you all of it because you keep me believing, you keep my imagination flowing because with you-- every dream, every wish is that much deeper because I get to share it with you.

And you know in the time since I wrote those things, it's only grown stronger. I see the future in her eyes and I feel incredibly lucky that I get to spend the rest of my life with my best friend.