A Gesture

As I pushed through my first week working at The Daily Collegian, a particular article assignment caught my attention and struck a cord deep within me. The article was to be about Penn State students who would be shaving their heads in honor of children with cancer. While that gesture would have been enough to move me on its own, it took me back for a particular reason. It brought me back to a personal experience that I think my mind had been trying so hard to block out.

My sophomore and junior years of high school I witnessed my mom's battle with breast cancer. I remember vividly well the day my mom decided she was tired of watching her hair fall out little by little. It was time to shave it and be done with it. I accompanied my mom to the wig shop where her head would be shaved that day sure that I would be a strong support in her time of need. Little did I know that I would be the one to break down at the sight of my mom, so strong and so beautiful, accepting a loss that seemed so detrimental at the time.

I turned my face away as I began to cry, ashamed that she was the one suffering and I was the one crying. We had originally intended to go get lunch together afterward, but I was in no shape to be in public by the end of the process.

When we got home my dad was there to meet us at the door. He hugged us both and ran his hand over my mom's freshly shaven head. I still remember his chuckle as he commented on what a mediocre job the woman at the wig shop had done. He quickly grabbed my mom's hand and led her up to their bathroom where he took out his electric razor and proceeded to even out her baldness as I looked on, still uneasy. And as he and my mom continued to giggle and find the humor in this sad situation, my dad turned the razor on himself and spontaneously shaved his head clean. I all of a sudden had two equally bald parents. For the first time all day, I cracked a smile.

That day there were no words that could have made me feel better. But as my dad shaved off patches of the hair he was so proud of still having, I realized the importance of a gesture. No one can always have the right things to say or the remedy to all problems, but sometimes a gesture as small as this can tell a person you are there without having to say a word.

That day my parents were both beautiful in my eyes, despite their physical alterations. That day I learned what it meant to say everything that needed to be said without ever speaking a word.