Penny For Your Thoughts

 To those who are friends, hello again. To friends from times past, I miss you. How are you? To the people I met in the first week of college, I've been cheering for you from here. To those I knew in high school, I'm cheering for you too. To those I knew in middle and grade school, look how far we've come.  To those who throughout the years have called me weird, I thank you because I am. To those who thought that I was not pretty or anywhere near it, know that beauty cannot define you or me. To those who whispered under their breath when I dared to be brave, be smart, I hope you've learned to use your voice in strength and for good. To those who picked apart my Instagram, did you find what you were looking for? To those who laughed behind my back, where is your true joy now? To those who saw me belittled, iced out, ignored, but did not speak up or to me, I understand why you saved yourselves. To those who watched my weight decline and saw the light leave my eyes, I prom...

 His face is becoming that of the man that my children will love and less of that which I fell in love with as a child myself. His features aren't as soft as they used to be, a bit more rugged and sharp, cut by the edges of one's early 20s. He's taller and broader, with a few days' shadow of stubble on his face that suggests that he's been too weathered to shave yet this week. His eyes, though, are unchanging and youthful and as joyous as they have been this whole time. Though time has molded the shapes of the boy I loved then into the man I love now, time has not changed the single quarter of brown in his eye that is so unique to him. Cheers to the man of hours, to our love, and to our lives. -Emma Lancaster