00:00And it's just about, you know, doing the right thing, putting your heart in the right place,
00:04and you're going to help more people than you ever realize. So the story goes like this. I own a
00:08small
00:09hair salon, and every Thursday at 4 p.m. for eight months, the same woman booked an appointment.
00:13She never got a haircut. She just sat in the chair, looked into the mirror, and asked me to
00:18brush it. And I didn't know why until she suddenly stopped showing up. Her name was Renee, 52 years
00:25old, always early, always polite, always tipped in cash, even though she barely let me touch her
00:30hair. The first few weeks, I thought she was just really particular. And then one Thursday,
00:35she came in wearing a scarf instead of letting her hair show, and I understood. She had just
00:40started chemo. She just hadn't told me yet. I'm not ready to cut it, she said quietly that day.
00:48But I don't want to lose it without saying goodbye first. So every week, for as long as
00:56she had hair, I brushed it slowly, however long she wanted. We didn't always talk. Sometimes
01:02she cried. Sometimes she told me about her daughter's wedding, that she was terrified
01:05she wouldn't live to see. And in six weeks, most of it was gone. She asked me to shave the
01:11rest, and I did it for free. And I cried more than she did. But she looked at herself in
01:16the
01:16mirror for a long time that day and said, I look like a fighter. She kept coming in every
01:24Thursday, even though she didn't have hair anymore. Even during the roughest weeks of
01:29treatment, some days, she just sat in the chair with her eyes closed while I rubbed lotion
01:33in her scalp. It's the only hour all week that nobody needs anything from me, she once told
01:39me. And then one Thursday, she didn't show up. No call or anything. And I told myself that
01:45she was just tired from treatment. The next week, the same thing. But then on the third
01:50week, a young woman walked into my salon holding a small box. It was Renee's daughter.
02:01Renee had passed two weeks earlier. In the box was a photo of her with her hair and a note
02:09saying thank you for making Thursdays feel like mine again. Her daughter asked if I would
02:14do her hair for her wedding that Renee never got to see. And of course I said yes. And
02:18of course I did it for free. And I tucked her mother's photo into the flowers around the mirror
02:23where she sat every week, every Thursday at 4 p.m. And I still leave that hour open because
02:29some habits you don't want to break even when the reason is gone.
02:39Wow. I'm not crying. You're crying. We all are cutting onions. Wow. That was, that was amazing.
02:49Thanks for sharing that, Andy. I'm sure I've, you know, given your current stature, you know,
02:55month and a half or two months or a little over a month, double mastectomy recovery. And,
03:00you know, what your future holds for you, for you to share that story is, shows a lot of strength.
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