Don Follis 3/23/2001 religion column:
"Red-haired sister gives hope to clients"
My younger sister's flaming red hair covers most of the southeast side
of
Wichita, Kansas. She lives with her redheaded husband and her
three
redheaded boys in a gray house. The boys have their red hair
closely
cropped above their ears. "We5reds" reads the license plate on
their van.
The hair on my sister's
head is like the hair of Absalom, King David's son
who was praised throughout Israel for his good looks and flowing locks.
Every year when Absalom cut his thick hair, it weighed 5 pounds.
My sister's blazing hair dips and bounces several inches below her
rear
end. "How do you wash it?" I asked.
"I get up early," she said.
She washes it, dries it, and adds assorted
gels to it. When she stepped from her bedroom into the kitchen,
the only
thing I could think to say was "Whoa, Nellie. Look at that beautiful
hair."
When she walks it covers
her entire back. She steps into a store and
everybody notices. Bright red lipstick accentuates her huge smile.
As we were driving to the
day spa where she works in upscale Wichita, she
was telling me how much she loves her job. "God has given me
an ability to
engage with people. I love people, and I really enjoy making
people feel
good about themselves," she said. "My husband always tells me
that people
come for a therapy session as much as for the facial."
Apparently she and her stunning
hair work their magic just fine at the spa
called Individually Yours. She spends her working week giving
about 40
women facials and waxing eyebrows, lips and legs.
The facials she gives are
no little make-up sessions from the Mall of
America. Her facials come with lights, soft music, mudpacks,
a steam
machine, whirling brushes on your face and warm cream on your arms
and
shoulders.
Brushing her flaming hair off her shoulder, my sister puts her strong
hands
to work. She begins massaging your hands, your arms, your shoulders
and
your neck while helpers wave palm branches, creating an ocean breeze.
Okay, there are no helpers
with palm branches. But you can easily imagine
them. "And what happens," my sister says, "is that my clients
forget their
troubles and totally relax." At $70 a pop I certainly hope so.
"Hey, don't knock the price.
This is hard work," she said. "There are
days when I have to soak my hands and forearms in a bucket of ice between
clients because my wrists are aching."
My sister would be glad
to give you the royal treatment, too, but not for
about six weeks. That's how far she's booked up. If you
get in to see
her, your face will be as clean as it has ever been in your entire
life.
However, you'll quickly
discover that the experience is not about your
face or your hand massage. It's about something much deeper.
"Everybody
creates something," my sister said. "I create emotion.
I believe all
people are beautiful, and I tell them so. I ask them how they
are doing.
Suddenly they are unloading everything and we are becoming friends.
I
always look for a connection between where my clients are and what
I can
give them."
Author Os Guinness said,
"Somehow we human beings are never happier than
when we are expressing the deepest gifts that are truly us."
"I totally agree," my sister
said. "God has called me to this. I make a
very good living doing this. But there's a real ministry for
me. It's a
vocation that I love, but I go to work everyday wondering whom I'll
get to
encourage."
In "The Power and the Glory,"
Graham Green wrote "There is always one
moment in childhood when the door opens and lets the future in."
It was true for my sister.
"At age nine I was selected honor camper for
the week by my peers and the other camp counselors. Everyone
liked me, and
I knew then, 'I do people,'" she said.
But she contends the purpose
of giftedness is stewardship and service, not
selfishness. Her calling to be with people precedes her job and
career.
Author Guinness says it this way: "Instead of, 'You are what
you do,'
calling says: 'Do what you are.'"
If I had to write on my
sister's report card, I would simply say, "She
plays well with other children." People energize her. She
and her
dazzling red hair give them hope.
Don Follis is an Urbana minister. Reprinted with permission from
the
Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette, copyright 2001.