Why I care

This weekend I was asked, “Why do you care?  Why do you care whether someone spends the weekend wallowing in their barracks room or eats dinner or sleeps or feels like shit?  Why do you care?”

It wasn’t a jerk question.  It was real talk.  And my answer was real–that I care about people who are trying to get it together themselves and are being introspective and are seeking answers and I want to help them on that path.  But it’s unsettled me, that question.  I’ve been asked how I care so much, which is different (and also unanswerable) and I’ve been asked how I survive caring so much (which I have a short answer and long answer for–though sometimes I just barely scrape by) but why is different.  

Why may have a root in the fact that in every person in the world (good or bad) I see a reflection of myself that I want to shield from suffering the way I want to be shielded.

I don’t know, but I’m sure it’s what I’ll be writing about for a while.