Begrudgingly anecdotal.

I'm gonna sound incredibly trite in about two seconds, but, really, I think people just want to be cared for. And not to macrocosm my microcosm, but I will anyway--Because I love to be cared for, I'm sure others do, too.
I'm thinking of the woman I work for. She didn't want to get out of bed today, so I propped her up (part of her disease causes her to uncontrollably lean to the right), washed up her face, hands, cleaned under her nails, combed her hair, changed her gown, cleaned her reading glasses, made her breakfast, and touched her arm as I was telling her about babysitting our friend's 5 month old puppy over this Easter weekend. I left the room for a moment and the thought hit me, that here she is--unable to drive, walk, get to a fridge, bathroom, grocery store, so all she can do is wait to see how I will care for her...how I will meet the specific need, that is particular to her. I'm sure mother's and father's of mini-munchkins feel this way, too. These two things are sort of extreme examples of how people need to be cared for, but there are also the daily ordinary need/want of people who may not be in such big-like situations. My best friend from college knows I love receiving mail, so she makes sure she sends me a card on a pretty regular basis. She takes care of me, the very center part of me, that tells me someone is thinking of the things that I particularly love and they wish to show me that they know me by this. I try to do this for my husband...specific Ess Gee-ism's that make him feel known and cared for by me. And vise-versa. I know the woman I work for isn't a huge fan of commercials, but she records her favorite soaps and watches them all in one lump sum. So while I cannot stand watching these soaps with her, I will read in the other room and when I hear the commercial come on, I go into her room every time and fast forward through the commercial for her. Funny little thing to note, but she thanks me every time. The simplicity of that act makes me feel inferior in some ways. My job is not academic. My job is not clean, neat, nicely put away. My job is not creating drinkable water for a country in Africa. It's not flashy, educational, particularly extensive. I am reminded of the time our family sat around the table one Christmas Eve. I was with part of the family I didn't know all that well and I was a little intimidated by their world travels, their wealth, their studies. And we were playing this game of question asking, and the HUGE question came up of, "What is your purpose in life?" Or something like that. And each one of us went around and had to answer this. I said, feeling like Fivel on American Tail when he sings to the moon Somewhere Out There, "To love. And to love well." I don't know, perhaps the worldly accolades will come later;-), but right now I'm working on caring for folks, and working on doing this well.