Thank You

It was wonderful.

In addition to all the time I’ve spent preparing our final paperwork today, not to mention being distracted by the continuous updates and beautiful photos posted on Facebook, the real reason I haven’t updated yet is that I don’t even quite know where to begin.

I guess I’ll begin with the most obvious words: THANK YOU.

Thank you to absolutely everyone involved in every way. Thank you to my tireless volunteers, the beautiful registrars who welcomed everyone to the event: Becky, Ann (Austin’s old nurse practitioner, who’s not old at all) and my mom. Thank you to the brilliant and trustworthy (and also beautiful) treasurers who collected all your money: Julie, Brenna and Mark.

An extra thank you to Mark for doing every single other thing I asked of him, including not complaining about the state of our house over the past week or so. Instead, he up and mopped the kitchen floor on Friday. Love that man.

Thank you to the happy faces who sold (and gave away) the delicious treats from our Bake Sale table: Betsy, Luci and Peg, and my mom and dad. And thanks to the talented bakers — I don’t even know who made all of that food, but everything I saw (or tried!) was fabulous. We made an additional $213 (thanks to people who read my sign):

Thank you to the City of Cleveland Heights, who were gracious and supportive and easy to work with, every step of the way.

Thank you to the endlessly hard-working women of Cut Hair Studio: Laura, Breanna, Mandy and Britney. You worked quickly and tirelessly and put everyone at ease.

Thank you to Dallas, who took all these beautiful pictures and many many more. I will upload them all over the next day or two to a public site so everyone can browse them and even order some if you want. Dallas, as with everything you do, these are just perfect.

Thank you to Balloon Bender Dave, who I never met but I could see him there in the back of the room entertaining the kids. Thank you to Faith and the kids from the MacConmarra Irish dance Academy, who drove all the way from Akron to show their moves and add a bit of Irish flair to our event.

Thank you to the Heights High Singers who got short shrift because we were so engaged in the head-shaving when they arrived that we simply didn’t give them the attention they deserved.

And now… now that I’ve warmed myself up a bit, now it is time to say thank you to the incredible and incredibly brave shavees. Oh, I wish Braedan were still awake because he’s my walking thesaurus and I don’t know how many times I can use the words wonderful and generous and fantastic and brave and, oh, what else would he say? Maybe stupendous and stellar and spectacular… Inspiring and uplifting and moving. Heroic. You were all all of those things.

Kid after kid, some seeming much smaller than they had just a few days earlier, walking right up to those seats and hopping up and scrunching their little eyes shut as the hairs began to drift down their faces. They sat still, with very few tears, and let strip after strip of hair fall to the floor. And they were so proud; those bright clear faces, no longer hidden behind shaggy bangs, just beamed. They beamed.

So many parents told me what I already knew, that this was an incredible and rare opportunity for these kids, some as young as three, to truly make a difference, to feel the impact they’re having on the world. Those little kids impacted their world. That’s a big deal.

It wasn’t just kids, of course. We had several adult shavees, including a couple of fathers who shaved alongside their sons, beautiful images of families doing something big and important side-by-side (which is exactly where we should be when we do things big and important).

There was a sweet older man who stopped me on the way out to say that he’d sent a message to his brother to tell him what he was doing, only to hear back that the brother had already signed up for an event wherever he lives, somewhere like Florida, without knowing!

And, of course, there was Kristi. I knew it would be a big deal, for me and for everyone there, but I can never quite predict which moments are going to get me. This moment got me. As I started to introduce her, right in the beginning because she was afraid to wait around too long and had requested an early slot, I just lost it. I couldn’t even begin. I pulled it together but I’m not even sure what I said, except for leading the crowd in a brief — but I hope rousing — round of “Glaaaa-sier! Glaaa-sier! Glaaaa-sier!”

I know that I did say what a hugely powerful statement she was making to all the young girls gathered there, especially her students. In fourth grade, they’re right at that age when physical appearance starts to take on an enormous and often unfortunate value in their lives. Here was a role model telling them that there are more important things in life than having nice hair:

I know for a fact that at least one of these sweet girls is thinking seriously about shaving her head next year.

Now that was the only moment, nope, not at all. As you know, there was a woman, a fellow Fairfax mom, who shaved her head on Austin’s behalf two years ago. You can read that story here, because that was definitely another St. Baldrick’s high. This year, her three sons, in second, sixth and eighth grades, shaved their heads:

As soon as they’d finished, I had turned away from the seats for one brief minute, when Mark came and tapped me on the shoulder, urging me to look back. There, scrambling into the barber’s chair, all eager and certain, was their little sister, sweet four-year-old Leah, pigtails and all. She had been toying with the idea of shaving over the past two months, one day she’d want to join her big brothers and next door neighbor, the next she’d rather be Rapunzel. But after watching her three heroes and then seeing Kristi shave her own head, well, that did it… Leah was in.

And, if you can believe it, that’s still not all. There was a mother-daughter team who shaved together this year for the second time, in honor of their little cousin, who lost her battle at age two. Well, it wasn’t until I announced them and mentioned the girl’s name that Ann, the “old” nurse working the Welcome table, realized she had treated that girl. Oh, there were lots of tears and hugs following that one. Peg, the mom, had emailed me a few weeks ago to see if I knew of any children who had survived cancer who might help shave her head. Uuuuhhh, yeah, I think I know one of those:

What a day. There’s still more, including countless more pictures, and links to all the media from yesterday.

But, for right now, all I can say is THANK YOU.