conspicuous lotion consumption
I had my spa appointment yesterday at the Sugar House (warning, site plays music).
Oh, I feel so much better.
The package Tom gave me- an hour of massage, and then the fancy spa mani/pedi- lasted three and a half hours. Three and a half hours of oils and lotions and massaging and all that stuff. *melt*
I arrived a few minutes early to change for the massage- the robe that was in my changing room was the small size and I found it… inadequate. I mean, I realize that I’m only walking from one end of the hall to the other, but this robe didn’t cover me enough even for that purpose. Not good. So I got another robe and headed off to meet the massage therapist.
Fortunately, I got over my whole “naked with a stranger touching me” hang-up pretty quickly. Getting a backrub from the person you love is great, but it does not compare to getting a proper massage from a professional. The back massage alone was worth the price of admission. Being the sort of person I am, though, I found myself a little preoccupied with the etiquette of the situation. When you’re lying on your back and the therapist is working on your hands (and therefore possibly in your line of sight), where do you look? It felt a little creepy to look directly AT her. Do you close your eyes? Stare at the ceiling?
Yes, I am so neurotic that this is what I’m thinking about in the middle of a massage.
With that done, I put my clothes back on and headed off to the mani/pedi area. Now, I’ve had a plain ol’ pedicure at Sugar House before, and it was very nice. But yesterday, I was there for the fancy, upgraded, spa pedicure. An ordinary mani/pedi involves some soaking of the hands and feet in warm water, a little lotion, some maintenance of the nails and some pumice on the feet to exfoliate, and then your nails get painted. Relaxing, and easy.
The spa version, on the other hand, involved like three layers of additional pampering in the middle of all this. A salt scrub on my feet and lower legs, which were then wrapped in hot towels for a few minutes. Then the towels came off and the salt scrub was rinsed away. Then some thick moisturizer and a little dry oil spray. Then a paraffin treatment, which of course was then covered in plastic bags and wrapped in towels to sit for a few minutes. Once the wax came off, MORE moisturizer and dry oil spray. And THEN she painted my toenails. It was pretty nice.
But now imagine repeating the whole process on your hands. And it was at this point that I learned something really important about myself:
I’m really freakin’ impatient. I think I can turn it off, but I can’t. I’m so impatient that I’m sitting there in the middle of all the lotions and paraffin and stuff thinking, “geez, enough with the lotion already.” Now, to be fair, I had skipped breakfast and it was almost 1 PM at this point, so I was pretty hungry and that certainly contributed. But as I noticed this, I had to remind myself that I had taken the whole day off work for a reason, and that reason was so that I could go sit in a room and let other people fuss over me for a few hours and emerge all soft and sweet-smelling with pretty sparkly nails.
But aside from the disconcerting realization that I don’t know how to just shut up and enjoy some pampering, it was a lovely day.
January 18th, 2007 at 12:34 pm
I felt exactly the same way during the upgraded manicure I got myself before going back to Cincinnati with an engagement ring… I kept reminding myself that I would be very happy that my hands were all taken care of since people would be glancing at them.
January 25th, 2007 at 1:32 am
btw, you should be relaxing with your eyes closed. And at a good spa (like Sugar House) the massage therapist gauges talking by whether or not you talk. But then there’s me who’s asking a thousand questions about how you become a massage therapist, where did you go to school, is this a good place to work, etc. I think they all know about me now
(Leslie says “Of course you talk to them. But what does everyone else do?”)
January 25th, 2007 at 10:07 am
It seemed like it would be hard to converse with someone with my face planted in that weird face rest thing. Which was far more comfortable than it looks, btw.