Something to Get Up For…

We were touched and moved in our hearts by the lighter step, the happier look, and the eager lift in her voice. She was no longer young, something short of being called elderly, of unknown age, but she had found a humble and congenial job. “It gives you something to get up for”⎯she said⎯and there was a light on her face as she said it.
“Something to get up for!” Then we remembered the man, past the age of retirement, living alone; some friends, but no family; enough to live on, but little to do, who said somewhat sadly almost those same words, but with an opposite application. “There isn’t much to get up for in the morning,” he said.
We all need something “to get up for.” Getting up may not be necessary as a matter of money. There may even be no urgent obligations or pressures or dependents. But if we don’t have something to get up for in life, we are surely going to get down.
We are all at our best when someone or something needs us, when something is depending upon us. We have to have something to get up for, for the effective living of life.
The teacher has to “get up” for his teaching. He may not feel up to it; he may be weighted with worries or personal problems, but he has to play the part; more that that, he has to live his part, and actually feel the earnestness and enthusiasm that the student must feel from him.
Parents have to be up for their children, even when there are worries, even when hearts are heavy. (The cheerful greeting for children returning from school, the feeling that home is a pleasant place, a place of faith and confidence and courage, will help make a boy and a girl feel they want more to come home, and will give a wonderful lift to life.)
We all need something to get up for. Even if we’ve retired, even if working isn’t necessary for our survival, it is necessary for the lift in our lives. And the person who takes the risk and responsibility of planning and providing constructive employment for other people is a benefactor of society, because he gives them something to get up for.
Now and always⎯and everlasting forever⎯we shall need to feel useful; we shall need to feel wanted; we shall need to know that we are “engaged in a good cause.” We need to know that we are doing something besides just sitting.
And here and now we will live longer and happier and be in better health if we find some good work or give willingly some service, and don’t assign ourselves to the shelf.
I shall not soon forget the lift of the voice and the look in the eyes, when she said: “It gives you something to get up for.”