True Grit

Grit is an attitude — a personal creed that you can conquer anything if you just put your mind and body to it. It is the unwavering purpose and the resilience to stick to that purpose whatever the outcome.

I spent some time today with a person that showed true grit.

She has been my hair stylist for most of the time that I have lived in Kingston. Until May of this year. Then she went away.

She had been dealing with a brain tumour and it was growing at an accelerated rate. It had impacted her hearing and her fine motor control on one side of her face. Her medical team decided that major surgery was required immediately and she went to a hospital in Toronto for treatment.

I received the call from the shop a few days before she was scheduled to leave. They wanted to let me know about her situation and that she had requested me to come in to the shop that week so that she could see me before she left. The shop wasn’t sure if she would be back.

I made a booking for the next day. When I met with her, she told me that she would be back to work in August. And she was close. She came back to work this week. I had my appointment with her today. It was wonderful to see her again.

She shared her experience of getting through the surgery and her determination to relearn how to stand, how to walk, how to use her face and how to use her eyes. She had set her goal to regain her mobility and her health, to get back to work and to regain her life. And she never wavered.

I truly hope that this is all behind her now. And she did a great job with my hair. As she always has.

True grit.