The following editorial appeared Sunday in the Philadelphia Inquirer.

The story is one of sorrow and humanity. The very telling is a triumph of humanity.

Scott O’Connor, son of former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, recently told an Arizona television station that his father, John, 77, an Alzheimer’s patient in a Phoenix assisted-living facility, had fallen in love with another patient there. In a heartbreaking irony, Sandra Day O’Connor is said to be happy that her husband, who had been extremely distressed at his institutionalization, is happy.

No reason to think she is other than sincere. She has been married to John O’Connor for 55 years, and to see his fear and pain must have been intolerable. All things said, it must be a comfort to sit with him as he holds hands with his new friend. To lose memory is to lose identity – our past, our connections.

No matter who they may have been before – parents, children, spouses, friends – those with Alzheimer’s often become strangers to us and we to them. But they still need love, even with identity lost in the mist. Why deny your beloved that love, even if it is not with you?

O’Connor left the Supreme Court in 2006, in part to care for her husband. It’s tempting to call such renunciation of prominence and influence heroic, but, then, unsung heroism is all around us. An estimated 5 million-plus Americans have Alzheimer’s, and many of them are cared for by family members who forgo privilege, power and income to do the right thing. (A large proportion of such caregivers are women, and this country should do more, in the way of tax breaks and other encouragements, to support the stay-at-home caregiver.)

The love-in-a-nursing-home scenario is not uncommon. Experts say that in the isolation and frustration of the institution, many reach out and find others. Last year’s acclaimed film “Away From Her,” starring Julie Christie, is the story of such a liaison.

O’Connor continues an exemplary life in which she has taken seriously the obligation of the public person to model right actions for right reasons. She has long been a champion of women in the law and other professions. She has lectured on the Constitution and the need to conserve the environment. She has warned against the role of special interests in our judicial and electoral processes. And here, in deed more than word, she again is modeling right action, sacrifice, devotion and compassion.

What are her lessons? That sometimes you have to drop what you’re doing – all of it, career, aspirations, influence – and help. That sometimes love means letting go, letting be, wanting what the beloved wants, even if one is left out. That there can be comfort in the midst of loss.

Millions and millions of people need to hear this, to see this.

Call it noble, unselfish, or call it (as O’Connor probably would) “just what you do,” in letting the world know her story, she is seeking to comfort the many others in similar circumstances, and to teach those who soon may be. No one alive can ask a higher calling than care of those we love – or a greater blessing than to be loved like this.