There were no last-minute tears of regret, just cheers from the audience as Parker Winfield had his shoulder-length hair chopped off in front of the entire Conestogo Public School on February 4, fittingly on World Cancer Day.
![Parker Winfield said goodbye to his long hair on Wednesday as he donated it to Locks of Love after growing it out since 2013. [Whitney Neilson / The Observer]](https://www.observerxtra.com/content/images/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/post_haircut.jpg)
The decision to grow his hair out wasn’t inspired by a close friend or family member dealing with cancer, just the desire to make his long locks useful.
“I just thought I had my hair kind of long already, and I thought I might as well grow it out and donate it to cancer,” Winfield said. “That’s the best way to do it, right?”
He started growing it in November of 2013. Up until the assembly this week, most people didn’t know why he was doing it.
“Nobody really knows,” Winfield said. “One day I just got up and thought why not grow it out and donate it.”
He said he didn’t think there was much reason to tell anyone. From this, a fundraiser was created at the school to help support the Kitchener Waterloo Hospice through the sale of ribbons. They had raised $980 by Wednesday, so he added in $20 to make it an even $1,000.
“From a small school I thought that was great,” Winfield said.
Mark Godin, strategic implementation coordinator with the hospice was on hand to receive the cheque and let the students know what their donation means for the charitable organization.
“It’s quite a lovely place, a beautiful building with 13 staff,” Godin said. “There are social workers, nurses, doctors who work in the building. We have beautiful gardens that are created by volunteers who work really hard at them. We have 250 volunteers at hospice. That’s a lot of people who are trained to help us in the work we do for people who have very serious illnesses.”
He told them the donation from the ribbon campaign was significant because despite being a place for those suffering from illnesses to live, they also do a lot of work with children. Last year they helped 800 people, all of whom have families.
Tara from Carolyn’s Coiffure in Elmira did the honors of cutting Winfield’s hair, having some fun with it first by putting it into pigtails before chopping it off.
His hair will go to Locks of Love, which makes wigs for children who’ve lost their hair due to medical treatments. Madonna Coffman created Locks of Love in 1997 after suffering with alopecia. Hairpieces are made free of charge for people under 21 in Canada and the Unites States who have medical hair loss.
Winfield said he’s had long hair pretty much his whole life, so he was used to it. But, he won’t miss the maintenance involved now that it’s short. As for if he’ll become a repeat hair donor?
“Probably not for a while,” Winfield said. “It might be like five years or so. I think I’ll get the courage up to do it again.”
