Coming home to a light left on for you is a small, quiet version of “we were waiting.”

Care does not always come out as words. In a lot of houses it shows up as a porch light, a plate in the microwave, a door left unlocked. Somebody thought about the hour you would get back and did something small about it. That is a sentence, just written in electricity instead of language.

Start reading the language around you. Who fills your water bottle, who saves you a seat, who texts when the weather turns. Then send one back this week in the same currency: leave something ready for the person who usually leaves things ready for you.