Scared to My Roots

I had a hair appointment today. I love the woman who does my hair. She has the best color sense and a gift for seeing the whole person: face shape, hair type, and personality. She was the person who told me, “You have 43 cowlicks; your style will always be messy, sexy layers with lots of movement.” After learning that about my hair I now just ask for “messy sexy layers” and my hair looks and feels like me. And it moves a lot. Just like me.

She is also a great people person. We talk about relationships, men, sex, aging, work, and we talk about his cancer and how that changed my life. Therapy and great hair for just one, well, pretty big price.

Today when I sat down she said, “I’ve been worried about you.” She told me about another client that she’d mentioned before. This other client, a man, also had colon cancer about a year before John. She has used his story as a way to console and encourage me. The other guy did well and was always doing well. He just remarried a few months ago.

But now, bad news for this man I never met and whose name I don’t know. Cancer has returned and it’s wicked. Pancreatic cancer at full blast and “He has”, she tells me, standing very still behind my chair, looking at me in the mirror, “he has a year to live.”

I sit for 30 minutes while that information and the new warm-toned, golden hair color penetrates to my roots. Cancer back. New marriage. A year to live. Am I looking in my own mirror?