Here is something I witnessed today that has touched my heart a great deal.  When I first got wind that the mother of a student of mine was stricken with cancer, my heart went out to their family. I had only met the mother once in April at a parent-teacher meeting. She had seemed well then. Over the next couple of months, I heard she had been in and out of the hospital, receiving treatment for her cancer. Nothing quite prepared me for her visit today as she attended the second parent-teacher meeting for the year, together with her husband.She arrived looking somewhat more tired and very much thinner than she had been before. Hiding the effects of chemotherapy under a brightly-coloured scarf, she appeared calmer and more cheerful than I had last seen her. What touched my heart the most was her husband who stood beside her, holding her hand, his head cleanly shaven bald as well. The message seemed clear. He did not have to utter a word yet his shaven head sent a strong and powerful message: If you have to stare at my bald-headed wife, please stare at me too because I am with her.

Perhaps some of us might say it is no big deal for a man to have his head shaven bald but then again, he did not have to. He chose to. I guess this is his way of telling his wife he loves her. It is his way of telling her I am trying to understand what you are going through. But most of all, it is a loving and thoughtful gesture of a husband’s support for his ailing wife who right now needs his strength through probably the most difficult time in her life. Love is indeed, a very splendid thing.