for me, from no one

I love you all the time.

I love you with dirt on your hands and under your fingernails—smudged on the knees of your gardening pants. I love the bits of twig and leaf stuck in your hair.

I love the way you drink conversational coffee, cradling the mug in both hands, looking not quite at me across the booth as you string thoughts together. I love the way you talk, intelligent and whimsical and humble and just plain interesting.

I love you when your feet can’t help but tap to the music, when you groove in the car—how you twirl down the hallway when you think no one’s watching—how your eyes light up when I ask you to dance.

I love you all the time.

I love you in the kitchen, apron-clad, both hands busy but not frantic, singing with the radio as you roll out pie crust or chop carrots. I love the way you offer no excuse when you lick the beater—and the bowl—and the spatula.

I love you when you laugh—at yourself, or any other hundred things—your grin wide and unashamed, or lopsided and wry. I love that it is so easy to make you laugh.

I love you with cheeks blooming pink with exertion, sweat trickling down your temples, gathering in wet patches across your back and belly. I love the way you lay it all out—as if you missed the memo on how to play like a lady.

I love you all the time.

I love you lost in a story, your eyes fixed on the words before you but your mind far from the chair you sit in—sideways, legs across the arm, head leaning against the plush, curved wing.

I love you dolled up and sweet-smelling, wearing a dress of your own making. I love the way you hold your head high, the erect bearing of your shoulders—your walk, how it subtly changes gears when you slip on your girlish shoes. I love that you still look like you, dressed up or down—always, always simply you.

I love you when you cartwheel sloppily across the lawn, climb a tree, scramble over the boulders. There is poetry in the way you run headlong down the big dune and straight into the lake.

I love you all the time.