WHY WE LOVE

Sometimes you learn to love through others and because of this, you become a better person.

This is why I love you.

You're my wife, my best friend, my lover. You're the mother of my children, my teacher, my philospher. You're my mentor, my psychologist, my listening post. You're my health advocate, my inner poet, my muse.

You're the very best thing that could ever happen.

Love forever and always, Michael

Spring

Dearest Deborah,

There's nothing better than springtime. The birds are back and the squirrels are everywhere and the sun comes up earlier and hangs around later. The sky seems bluer and the moon whiter and the sun yellower and I guess that's why they say springtime is for lovers and so I thought of you.

Holding your hand in the park.

Making out in the pickup truck.

A giant bear hug when I come home from work.

And when I leave for work.

And when you visit me at work.

And inbetween work and play.

Springtime.

I'm thinking about you.

Love forever and always, Michael

Soup

Deborah,

I made soup last night, thick and hot with just the right amount of spice. It was exactly right--hot enough to satisfy.

And I thought of you.

Wintertime is coming to a close, the snow is drizzling. You are my blanket, my night, every star to guide me through the darkness.

Yet love is more than heat and spice and salt. Love is friendship and companionship and converstion long into the evening. Love is having someone's back. Love is sharing your sense of taste and sight and touch.

Love is being with you.

Love forever and always, Michael

Good Morning, Beautiful

When I left for work, the sky was gray and overcast, the ground wet with drizzle and frost, the sun just coming into itself, day just beginnning. I thought of you, still warm in bed, the blankets warm against your body. I pulled my scarf tighter and thought how much I would rather be with you, but we live here and I have to make a living, so I continued on my way.

And you know what?

The gray sky took on a silver sheen, a brightness, a shock of love. The sidewalks and grass shimmered with pools of glitter and beauty. Daybreak, the sun trapped behind the clouds, and all I could see was how beautiful everything is because you are always with me.

Always.

Love forever and always, Michael

FRUIT

Dearest Deborah,

I bought some peaches at the fruit market today. I bit into one of them on the way to work. It's skin was like sweet meat and its insides melted into my mouth. Every bite was delicious and gratifying and it made me think of you.

How often do we forget the smallest details in our lives? When did we become so busy we can't focus on the little things?

We're not really that busy. We might want to think we are, but we're not. Everyone has time to pause and reflect, to read a poem or write one, to sit back on the train returning from work and look out of the window at the falling day and meditate or pray.

And so it is with you. I walked to work and ate the peach. I thought of you and chewed it. I wiped the juice from my mouth and felt your kisses, your tongue, your hair in my face, all of your love.

Thank you.

Love always and forever, Michael

The Leaf Fight

Dearest Deborah,

Do you remember the time we had a giant leaf fight? It wasn't our pile of leaves. We didn't help rake them up; they were just there for the asking and we went for it. Full force. Leaves flying everywhere.

That was one great October. It was a good year for leaves.

I remember how you laughed and shrieked. I remember how you ran. And I remember the leaves crowning your head like a princess. You are still that beautiful. Your smile is still that grand. Do you remember how we ended up hugging each other and rolling all over the pile of leaves--or at least what was left of it?

As our love grows brighter every morning, as our prayers are answered every dawn, I smile at the memories.

Love forever and always, Michael

Help

When I discovered my students were way behind in math--and you know I'm not the math teacher--I raised alarms everywhere. I'm so glad you're my wife. You told me we had been building the roof before we had built a foundation. How apt. And how right.

How could anyone expect my students to do prealgebra if they were still struggling with regrouping and long division? How did anyone expect them to do equations when they were stuck on X always being the symbol for multiplication? What's a variable? they asked.

Yes, you have to build the walls before you put on the roof and you have to build a foundation before you build the walls.

This is how our love is. One brick at a time. One piece of wood. One nail. One hammer. One piece of window pane.

Eventually you get there, and the door is open, and you are waiting at the threshold, and everything is exactly how it has to be.

Love forever and always, Michael

LOVE IS A RIVER

Love is like a river. Sometimes the current is strong. Other times it's weak. Once in awhile it gets passionate and floods the countryside. Other times it swallows its pride and lets the banks and sand bars diminish it. The river goes on, drying up and refilling itself, gaining incredible strength.

No one can stay in love forever. We have our weak points, our ego blasters, our simple pride. But, Deborah, our love has lasted many years and yet it grows stronger, like the river gaining strength from the snow packs melting into it as we speak.

As the water rises, so does our passion. As the water gains strength, so does our love.

The river's current is our current, too, and just thinking about it makes me fall more in love with you. (Sorry, the rhyme was unintentional.)

Love forever and always, Michael

memory

Dearest Deborah,

Poetry is love as is fiction as is modern art. There is perfume and color and all of the smooth sounds that reassure all of us. So it is not such a far reach to write that you and I find ourselves in a field of wildflowers, surrounded by a symphony of everything good with the world, and the wind brushing by has just the correct touch of cool. Nothing can ever be as perfect as this.

This is how I feel about you.

Love forever and always, Michael

Love Letters

Dearest Deborah,

Last night I finished the book, WALK TWO MOONS by Sharon Creek, a children's book, very well written, and I thought of you. Grams is so lifelike I wish I could meet someone like him in real life, but what made him so great was his traditions and his passions for his wife. Except for one. He never gave her a love letter until it was too late. I promised myelf when I finished the book later I would not make that mistake.

We've been married for awhile now and yet my love for you grows stronger by the day. I thought you should know this.

I wake early in the morning before I begin my long walk to work and I think how lucky I am to know you. I thought you should know this.

Last night the melody you played on the keyboard is the same music that plays in my heart. I need you to know this.

Love forever and always, Michael