By Dr. Linda Hodges

I saw her coming fast, blond toddler on the right hip, blond preschooler in tow. He was in the lead, Bermuda shorts in January, hurrying down the concourse. They were a young family moving opposite me in the Dallas airport, rushing to catch their plane.  I wondered where had they been ... maybe to Disney World for a delayed Christmas vacation? She was laughing, he was smiling and the kids were bright eyed as they hurried toward me.  

My trained eye moved closer in, and I noticed her pink baseball cap. She was so fair, with the children’s bright smiling blue eyes. Then I saw it, the familiar pink ribbon pin attached to her collar and then ... oh God, I saw she had no hair. The nurse in me said “She’s too young for breast cancer, she’s on chemo and ... and ... she’s completely bald.” She looked so happy as she laughed, hurrying to catch up with her young husband.

I turned my head, the image too painful to see, and I quickly rushed past. How can she have breast cancer, how horrible the ravages of chemo and yet she seemed so happy, so carefree? 

February came and the phone rang. The call I dreaded but knew I had to take had come. “Linda, I know you want to know. I’m so sorry, but the tumor is malignant. Meet me in the morning at 10 and we will plan your breast surgery for Friday.” I hung up the phone, the small space of fear in my chest before the call expanding, expanding, filling my body, filling my mind. I closed my eyes and then I saw her, smiling at me in her pink baseball cap. Was her image so permanently stamped in my brain a premonition? Is that why I now see her face, her bright blue eyes, her baldness, each detail so easily recalled? 

Today I bought a pink cotton cap. I also bought a white one, a black one with a rose on the back and a tan one. I bought a white straw hat and a blue hat with a big bill and a bow in the back. 

It’s March, the daffodils are blooming and waving their pretty yellow and white heads. Signs of spring are everywhere. Now I know why she was so happy in her pink baseball cap. She was euphoric just like me. Trading her hair for the pink baseball cap was the price of the insurance that I now must pay. For the price of my hair, I have the chance to live, the chance to laugh many times, the chance to feast upon the face of my unborn grandchild due in July, the chance to dance and the chance to dream of the husband I love and our time stretching into the future. 

Soon summer with all its heat and buzzing mosquitoes will come and fall will arrive with its golds, reds and purples. In my mind’s eye, I see the first blond curls beginning to emerge. I see her putting the slightly faded pink baseball cap in the bag for the Cancer Society. It’s Christmas and in the reflection of the Christmas tree lights I see her golden mane glowing like a halo. It’s Christmas, my tiny soft salt-and-pepper curls start to appear. If by chance we meet again in the Dallas airport come January we will not know it. We will walk quickly past, our pink caps – those badges of honor – gone, belonging to the others who will be making our journey.