A Father’s Beard

Between life and death,
when I prepared the final shave for patients who could not return to the living,
I often saw the image of my father overlapping with theirs.
Like him, with faces covered in heavy beards,
I carefully shaved them with patience and devotion.
One morning as a child,
I watched my father shaving with sleepy eyes and asked,
“Dad, what are you doing?”
“What else? I’m shaving.”
“Why do you shave?”
“Because a beard can make a person look worn down.”
Everyone grows up seeing their father’s beard.
At times it symbolized dignity and honor,
yet at other times it revealed fatigue and frailty.
For a nurse in intensive care,
a patient’s final shave can be their last farewell
as they cross from life into death.
It is a sacred moment, carried out with the deepest care.