The expanse of personal needs is wide. This week I texted someone whom I perceived as being much too busy to speak with me, and she called back. The conversation lasted an hour, and I realized that she craves connection as much as I do. Last month I shared a meal with a woman whose husband died long ago, and began to understand the cavernous hole that is left when your partner is gone. In spending time with young mothers whose lives are a relentless string of interruptions, I unearthed the memory of those intense years. Other people who are wrangling health problems that it didn't occur to me to worry about, brought my attention to the wide variety of woes available to the human spirit. 

In the gaps jimmied between these interactions, I held each person with love. I wished for them a reprieve from the assaults on their peacefulness, and sent up a prayer. 

But they seemed too insignificant, my invocations. It is not as if I have any medical knowledge, or offered to chase their toddler at the park for an afternoon. While my affection for each of them was genuine both in the moments we were together and in the wake of those meetings, it felt inadequate.

There is a children's book by Leo Tolstoy that I read to my little ones. It is called The Three Questions, and the last of them has lingered with me even as my brood has grown past snuggles on the couch.  Tolstoy posits that the most significant person in the world is the one standing right in front of you. 

This one.

The suggestion that my task is to attend fully to the person within reach brings the overwhelm down a notch. Three notches in fact.