You know the feeling you get when you are cleaning up other people's stuff? The way your jaw tightens when you come across uneaten breakfast dishes sitting on the table. Spilled juice that dries sticky on the wood? Cracker crumbs that can only be produced by truly reckless eating. Like Cookie Monster.

I spent a lot of time picking up after people, big and small. Occasionally, very occasionally, a tiny bit of resentment creeps into my brain. Just tiny, but still.

My blood simmers. Not boils, just simmers a little.

I was cleaning the table, crumpling up all the scraps of scribbled paper, tossing them in the recycling. I grabbed a small piece...and just before I allowed my fist to close around it, I glanced at it quickly.

My heart tightened. A flood of wetness in my eyes. "I love all of you," it says. Written in a six year old's tentative and laboured script. Sweet, sweet boy. 

I love all of them, too. I am lucky, happy, grateful, to pick up any and everything my people chuck around. I will take care of them. 

For as long as they will let me.