The path we take can also bring us back. This isn't one of my stories about someone I met, one of my "stories from the road." This is about the road.

It was a long time coming but my wife and I finally completed a dream. It was a journey of sorts that really didn't take us far. A little more than one hundred feet, in fact, from our back door to HOPE House.

HOPE House is just a converted shed. The initials stand for "Here Our Passions Evolve."

There are no phones, no clocks. Just a place to get away from whatever challenges our minds are facing that day. It is equipped with very little, but filled with opportunity. There you will find paint, clay, books, games, music, and a few musical instruments. You can do something or nothing at all. But this again isn't about a place. It's about the path to get there.

Marianne and I have this unspoken understanding that sometimes we need to wander up the path by ourselves. Such is life. I never even suggested it, we never even discussed it. It just has been understood.

It was on such an occasion recently that I discovered something. I watched my wife walk slowly up the pathway into HOPE House and close the door. I had no idea how long she would be, but I stayed right where I was looking out the window from our living room.

Why? Because I wanted to see her come back.

It was then I realized that I often speak about the road of life, the path I am on, and the steps to get me there.

Today I realized that roads and paths aren't always one way. It helped me to remember many times in my life when I headed in one direction in pursuit of a dream only find it was indeed the wrong road to take. I didn't stay there. I came back.

It's okay to come back. We sometimes put so much pressure on ourselves by thinking if we take the chance on a dream, there's no coming back. So we never take the first step.

Suddenly the door to our dream house opened and out came Marianne. I watched every step she took until she walked into the house.

I looked at her and said, "I had to see you return. You know how much I hate to see you leave. But I realized that I laid the stone for that path. I made it so that you can always come back to me."

I know one day one of us will walk ahead and the other will be left behind. That path is one way. The promise is, as I understand it, eventually we will meet again and never have to leave. I like that idea.

So, my friend, on your journey through life may every road you take always lead you back to the ones you love.