There’s just something about that feeling

when you rise to your feet when you were kneeling

A sense of pride and accomplishment

Give yourself a reason

and you can overcome anything through any season

“We bought a broken house”

These words began the story of a little girl much like a mouse

scared and afraid of what the world would do to her

she wasn't sure

But thats just a part of growing up

like getting older and putting on makeup.

But to me, its more than that

to me, it includes something bigger than that

To me, it includes a house

the “broken house”

Buying it when no one else would

and caring for it when no one else could.

Redoing some of the doors

but keeping the original floors

Long hours of scraping the old

flowery wallpaper off the cold

wall. Repainting in the summer:

the heat and humidity of the Tennessee summer.

Opening old cabinets and snakes falling out them

A colony of ladybugs falling from a hole in the ceiling making mayhem

The cracks in the walls

and the long hauls,

moving stuff in and out

and buying take-out,

because the kitchen wasn't finished

and the house wasn't furnished.

And piece by piece

the house would cease

to be broken.

We still work on it

a garden, an office, a patio, we built

We worked hard, but in the end

It was beautiful, the house we had to mend.

And that feeling of pride and accomplishment became known to me