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I'm in a marriage counseling session 24 years ago
The assignment is to draw your idea of home.
I drew a house with a backyard,
filled with raspberry bushes,
blackberry bushes,
apple trees ,
peach trees,
pear trees.
There are no people in my picture.

You and I marry on a cold and snowy February day 21 years ago.
The flower girl gets shy,
The photographer gets an attitude.
That burger from Hardee's was the best thing ever.
We move to an apartment,
I can only dream of buying a home.

Another year passes.
We look for a house.
I have three requirements;
Two toilets, because no one should have to wait in line to pee.
Room to plant that fruit in the backyard.
The right school system.
Each time we look at a house you tell me the foundation is bad.
I begin to wonder if you can really know that or if you just say that.

18 years have passed.
You must have known about foundations because ours still seems to be holding us up.
That sweet flower girl has created a beautiful life of her own.
Now it is just us.
We ran our rat race and jumped off the train
Tumbled down the embankment,
Lucky to not have broken much important.
Haggard and worn, we still reflect the love we see when we look at one another.

We piece together interests
Build new ones
Redefine our life
Rebuild our desires, along with three cars and five motorcycles.
We set out together along this path we are freshly paving.
Towards our new life,
faltering a moment here and there on the loose gravel
but having enough life experience between us to laugh it off
and I know it will be okay.

Take away the berries
The toilets (no not really)
The foundation
The vehicles
We can always start over
We can always rebuild.

You. You are my home.