Today they said it to me once more, lips curled in that faint, mocking smile, the tone that always blended a haughty note with outright contempt: Youre just the one who washes other peoples folk.
It isnt the first time Ive heard it, and it wont be the last.
Before, I would have turned away, lowered my eyes, because I saw no point in arguing. Yet on this occasion I chose not to stay silent.
Yes, I wash.
But those who utter the word with derision only glimpse the surface. They cannot fathom what lies beneath, for I do far more than merely wash.
I touch old age with tenderness, with the caution one employs when cradling something fragile and defenseless. I feed those who can no longer lift a spoon. I brush tangled hair, trim ragged nails, help pull on a cardigan. Sometimes I simply sit beside them, quiet, when the ache is not of the body but of the soul. I listen to stories that no one else seems to care for, yet for them those tales are whole worlds, memories that warm the dwindling years.
I look after those who once lifted others, raised children, built houses, tended the sick, taught the young and now they themselves need support. In these daily, routine acts there is no humiliation, only dignity. No weakness, only worth.
It is not dirty work. It is an act of humanity.
Patience, love, the ability to remain a human being when others turn their eyes away. For when a person is powerless, wholly dependent on another, true kindness is put to the test.
And when someone sneers at it, I think: they have never stood in the very place where help is needed. They imagine strength to be measured in pounds, in a lofty career, in a title. Yet true strength is staying beside anothers frailty, not turning away, not reviling, not diminishing.
I could not endure a job that demanded false pretence, flattery, deceit for profit. Yet it is those very roles that often earn respect, while ours is undervalued, as if we stand beneath everyone else.
I know that is not so. In our quiet there is dignity. In our hands there is warmth that returns a sense of self to the aged. In our work there beats a heart that never tires of compassion.
A day will come when those who scorn us can no longer stand on their own. Perhaps then they will see: my work is not about washing bodies. It is about restoring humanity, a touch that heals, a warmth that whispers: you are still alive, you matter, you have not been forgotten.
Yes, I tend other peoples folk. I do it with respect, tenderness, and pride. For perhaps someday it will be me. Or them. And then, I hope, there will be someone beside them who does the same with love, without disdain, without fear, simply as a decent human being.
