The flying ponytail

Astronaut Suni Williams sent an unusual package back to earth this week -- her ponytail. According to a report on the ABC News Web page, Williams arranged in advance to send her ponytail back to earth from space on Day 11 of the flight.

This astronaut definitely lives up to her name. Like girlfriends at a slumber party, astronaut Joan Higginbotham, Williams' colleague on the space shuttle, cut her hair for her on Sunday. Williams' hair is coming back on the Space Shuttle Discovery because she made plans before her launch to donate it to a program that uses hair to make wigs for cancer patients. What a wonderful idea.

This woman is sending more back far more than just a ponytail. She's sending out self-esteem for cancer survivors and inspiration to young girls everywhere. From the ABC news story:

Williams is also a Navy commander who has flown helicopters and logged more than 2,700 hours in 30 different aircraft. Does she consider herself a role model for young girls? "I hope so. I wasn't always the sharpest tool in the shed, the smartest kid on the block, but I think there was a lot of persistence," Williams said. "And I hope kids understand it is OK to fail, if you learn something from failing." Williams wants young, aspiring female astronauts -- and young girls in general -- to realize the value of persistence. "I tell little girls about the story of when I started flight school. 'Top Gun' came out, so of course everybody wanted to fly jets," she said. "That was the cool thing to do, and I put that down as my first choice but I got helicopters because there weren't that many jet billets."

"I did pretty good at that. You just sort of take what you get. Maybe you don't get the first thing that you want, but if you are good at what you do, and you try hard, some things sort of fall into place," she said.
"I hope that message comes across clearly, that if you want something, you can obtain it," Williams said. "Maybe not the path you thought you were going down, but it will work out if you try hard and are persistent."
Williams' persistence paid off. She finished her first space shuttle flight, and she is staying behind to become the flight engineer on the International Space Station for the next six months.
So her hair will have some time to grow back.