Beyond the Byline: Of Sen. McCain, a pink hairbrush and Old Spice

As we prepare for what could potentially be the absolute craziest presidential campaign cycle in American political history, I think about times when there were statesmen and stateswomen around to choose from for all offices.

Those days appear to be gone, but let’s hope not forever.

Recalling those days, my thoughts turned to a moment that will stay with me forever.

It was July 24, 2008, and then-Republican presidential candidate U.S. Sen. John McCain agreed to be interviewed by this reporter in the back of his tour bus — “The Straight Talk Express.”

I considered it an honor then and I still do today. Sen. McCain was a real American patriot — a hero — and a man who always stood by his convictions. Although I didn’t agree with some of Sen. McCain’s ideas, I still think he could have been a great president — there’s no doubt he was a great leader.

I was covering McCain’s campaign stop in Wilkes-Barre at the F.M. Kirby Center for the Performing Arts, and I got to ride with McCain on his bus after his rally.

But before I could ask the senator any questions, he had a few for me. He wanted to know who I was and where I came from, who my parents were and he asked all questions with complete sincerity. He really was interested.

So I told him as much as I could stumble out. When I told Sen. McCain about my parents, his interest piqued. I told him my mom and dad both lived most of their lives with a disability — mom had polio and wore a brace on her left leg and dad lost his right leg in World War II when he stepped on a land mine in Northern France.

McCain asked more questions of me and I answered them all. When we were through discussing my parents, McCain said this to me.

“Your parents are typical of the people who have always made this country great,” he said. “They are part of the fabric of America. They are examples of the people who built this country and made it strong. Thank you for sharing their stories with me.”

And Sen. McCain meant every word he said because, like my parents and so many other Americans, he was one of them.

McCain leaned back in his seat on his bus and talked candidly about politics, excessive spending and critical issues.

“We have to do what is for the good of America,” McCain said.

I’m glad I got to meet him and shake his hand. I’m glad I got to see how sincere he was. I’m glad I got to tell him about my parents and I am really glad that he listened and that he, too, valued them and all Americans like them who made this country great just by being who they were.

As I recall that conversation with Sen. McCain, my thoughts quickly went to my parents. I still long for the sound of their voices, their laughter, their wisdom and guidance.

You wouldn’t know it by looking at me today, but I once had quite a mop of hair. But growing up in the 1960s, when everything was changing in the world, my hair looked more like a frightened porcupine than a typical hippie sitting in an alfalfa field in Bethel, N.Y., listening to the best music ever.

My hair was wiry — it grew outward, rather than downward. Barbers would have to sharpen their scissors and razors before and after they cut my hair.

What is left is what Seinfeld’s George Costanza would call “the remnants of a once great civilization.”

When I see pictures of me with that hair, I cringe. What was I thinking?

Now, Mom had a glorious head of hair — it shined from her brushing it time and again. Her magical brush — a pink sort of plastic brush — that worked absolute wonders, even on my wiry hair.

So on one of those dark, dismal days following her death in May 1968, as I was packing up her stuff, I came across my Mom’s hair brush. I remember looking at it and staring at it and recalling all those precious times that she had used it to brush her hair and mine.

Even at age 17, I recalled thinking just how very few those times were, and I remember trying to deal with the reality that those memories were all I had now, with no chance of new memories to be made.

So, I took the brush and put it in my room. I have used it every day ever since. It is the one personal possession that still connects me to my mom and one of the few items of hers that I still have.

Sadly, the brush is not what it once was. The handle broke off years ago. I glued it together a few times, but it just kept breaking. Many of the plastic bristles are gone as well. But that brush still has, in my mind, my mom’s DNA, and mine, all through it.

So for 56-plus years now, instead of hugs and kisses from a living mother, I have had the loving caresses of that brush. When I use it to brush my hair, my mom is there again — trying to make me look presentable to the world.

And those memories come alive. This was her brush.

I apply the same logic to remember and think of my dad when I apply a little Old Spice cologne each day. Dad loved the smell of Old Spice. It was his go-to fragrance when he was heading out on a Saturday night.

My mom has been gone for 56 years — my dad left us in 1995.

But with a simple stroke of a tattered hair brush and a splash out of an ivory bottle of cologne, they are with me every day.