Together - 31 Days of Five Minute Free Writes

Stuffed into the bottom of a dresser draw sits a t-shirt. It's one I can't bring myself to give away. Yet, it's one I seldom wear.

The shirt is black with bright letters. I found it online and paid way too much for it. My husband has a shirt that matches, or more aptly, is it's counterpart.

My shirt reads:
TER
THER

My husband's shirt reads:
BET
TOGE

If we stand side by side together they read:

BETTER
TOGETHER

I bought them for our engagement. We have professional photos taken in them. My determination won out to get them in our photo shoot. We're both smiling wearing them. Mine is real. I believe Stephen's is hiding a grimace.

We packed them along for our honeymoon. Again, I packed mine proudly. I may have had to slip Stephen's into his bag. On our final day of hiking Acadia National Park we wore the shirts. If you looked at us separately our shirts didn't make sense. Gibberish. A secret language. Something indecipherable. But together standing next to one other at every photo op our shirts made a statement.

BETTER TOGETHER

A fellow hiker passed us once, looked at our shirts, smiled at Stephen and said, "Honeymoon, huh?"

The shirts are a prime example of how our relationship works. I have a grand idea, a dream trip, or a quick decision to change all our plans worn with a smile. Stephen takes his time, hesitates, and has trouble making decisions. I saw the shirts scrolling through Facebook one day and ordered them that same afternoon. Stephen would see the same shirts and laugh. He'd have left his in the bottom of his drawer happily.

We're six years into marriage now. After living in multiple states, working in various churches, adopting a dog, and bringing two children into the world we still have the matching shirts.

Back on our honeymoon the matching shirts spoke a hope that I had for our lives together. We were just starting out and we each vowed our lives to one another. I hoped that our shirts would foretell our future. I hoped we would really be better together. Now we have years of relationship joys and challenges behind us with plenty more to come. The words of the shirt are true. I'm still smiling. And so is Stephen. Because we're better together.

**All month I'll be participating in 31 Days of Five Minute Free Writes. Each day I'll take some time (sometimes 5 minutes and sometimes a little more) to sit down and write. It's about the discipline of writing each day. It's about listening to the words from within. It's about letting creativity work in me. I'll share my writing at some point during the day on my blog. Thanks for reading.