I know that everyone else in the world loves a massage, but I am unconvinced. This was the thought that came floating into my mind when I was having one on Sunday, and after that, I couldn't stop thinking about it, which kind of negated the point of the exercise, especially since after that I couldn't help focusing on all the things I didn't like. At the end of the hour, I felt hysterically anxious about it all. These were the things that upset me.
1) Having a stranger touch me while I'm naked. Now, I have read that in the US there are people who get paid (a handsome sum, apparently) to snuggle with you. I find this a repugnant notion - someone who may or may not have Simba chip breath coming to rub their chest hair on your back, as if you are a loving couple. I don't think massages are really all that different. The way the therapist tenderly pats you on your back while you are still wearing a towel, like you are a child getting out of a bath and they care about you deeply, when meanwhile they probably find you a bit off-putting (with the spots you missed while shaving and your cellulite valleys).
2) That near lesbian experience. I am talking about the way you have to lie with your arms at your sides, palms up, which becomes awkward when the therapist moves into certain positions. The effort to avoid touching her is most unrelaxing, especially as I then start thinking - does she notice that I am trying not to touch her? Does she think that is weird? It is weird. I am weird. But no I am not weird - no one wants to have an incidental lesbian experience, especially with someone wearing polyester.
3) The pressure to wear good underwear and groom. This is especially tricky for me. It shouldn't be difficult to go to the shops and pick out some knickers, I know, but I have tried three times in the past year and on each occasion have been so put off my stride by the neon hubcaps that that shops are trying to fob off as bras these days that I have walked out empty handed (has anyone else ever been tempted to try these on as a yalmulka, by the way?)
4) The touching in bad places. You know how we all have things that we can't stand. one of my friends feels ill if someone chews fabric near her (admittedly, she's safe most of the time); another cannot stand the sight of cottonwool. For me, it's the thought of someone touching the piece of skin that joins the underside of your toes to your foot. I call it my no-zone, and just thinking about it now is making me curl my toes. So when my therapist literally tucked her fingers around it the other day, I nearly passed out.
5) The whale music. Who on earth decided that the sound of dolphins' stomachs rumbling would be the perfect aural accompaniment to a back rub? I don't think that you should never have to listen to this sound, but when you are trying to relax those eerie moans, like the tortured souls of tree spirits that have moved on, sets teeth on edge. And makes one think of tie-dye and dreamcatchers and vegans, all of which are bad thoughts.
6) The strangeness of it all. A few years ago, James and I were having a spa treatment together when the therapist told us it was time for our Jacuzzi. With a naughty smile and a wink, she left us with a bottle of JC Le Roux (everyone's favourite!) and some brown bananas, to ponder the painting of the shyly smiling Thai girl pulling down one side of her bikini that had been thoughtfully hung up on the wall opposite (just in case we had missed the sexy ambience). There was no way I was getting into this stew of bodily fluids - even if they had considerately given James a paper G-string to wear (black, as it's the colour of seduction). On another occasion, we were both horrified when our therapist gently plopped a hot stone down our bums. All I could think of was the other hot stone that she had just placed in my palm, and the other, non-hand places it had been. (More horrifying still was the fact that, when we told other couples who had also been to this particular spa, none of them had had the same experience. Is there something about me and James that hints that we have peculiar anal fetishes?) Then there are the body exfoliations and the terrible, terrible experience of being wrapped in plastic, which never ever fails to make me feel like I am one of Dexter's victims. As a result, I always lie there thinking of all the bad deeds I have ever done, which is something bound to leave you feeling sad and guilty rather than lovely and relaxed.
1) Having a stranger touch me while I'm naked. Now, I have read that in the US there are people who get paid (a handsome sum, apparently) to snuggle with you. I find this a repugnant notion - someone who may or may not have Simba chip breath coming to rub their chest hair on your back, as if you are a loving couple. I don't think massages are really all that different. The way the therapist tenderly pats you on your back while you are still wearing a towel, like you are a child getting out of a bath and they care about you deeply, when meanwhile they probably find you a bit off-putting (with the spots you missed while shaving and your cellulite valleys).
2) That near lesbian experience. I am talking about the way you have to lie with your arms at your sides, palms up, which becomes awkward when the therapist moves into certain positions. The effort to avoid touching her is most unrelaxing, especially as I then start thinking - does she notice that I am trying not to touch her? Does she think that is weird? It is weird. I am weird. But no I am not weird - no one wants to have an incidental lesbian experience, especially with someone wearing polyester.
3) The pressure to wear good underwear and groom. This is especially tricky for me. It shouldn't be difficult to go to the shops and pick out some knickers, I know, but I have tried three times in the past year and on each occasion have been so put off my stride by the neon hubcaps that that shops are trying to fob off as bras these days that I have walked out empty handed (has anyone else ever been tempted to try these on as a yalmulka, by the way?)
4) The touching in bad places. You know how we all have things that we can't stand. one of my friends feels ill if someone chews fabric near her (admittedly, she's safe most of the time); another cannot stand the sight of cottonwool. For me, it's the thought of someone touching the piece of skin that joins the underside of your toes to your foot. I call it my no-zone, and just thinking about it now is making me curl my toes. So when my therapist literally tucked her fingers around it the other day, I nearly passed out.
5) The whale music. Who on earth decided that the sound of dolphins' stomachs rumbling would be the perfect aural accompaniment to a back rub? I don't think that you should never have to listen to this sound, but when you are trying to relax those eerie moans, like the tortured souls of tree spirits that have moved on, sets teeth on edge. And makes one think of tie-dye and dreamcatchers and vegans, all of which are bad thoughts.
6) The strangeness of it all. A few years ago, James and I were having a spa treatment together when the therapist told us it was time for our Jacuzzi. With a naughty smile and a wink, she left us with a bottle of JC Le Roux (everyone's favourite!) and some brown bananas, to ponder the painting of the shyly smiling Thai girl pulling down one side of her bikini that had been thoughtfully hung up on the wall opposite (just in case we had missed the sexy ambience). There was no way I was getting into this stew of bodily fluids - even if they had considerately given James a paper G-string to wear (black, as it's the colour of seduction). On another occasion, we were both horrified when our therapist gently plopped a hot stone down our bums. All I could think of was the other hot stone that she had just placed in my palm, and the other, non-hand places it had been. (More horrifying still was the fact that, when we told other couples who had also been to this particular spa, none of them had had the same experience. Is there something about me and James that hints that we have peculiar anal fetishes?) Then there are the body exfoliations and the terrible, terrible experience of being wrapped in plastic, which never ever fails to make me feel like I am one of Dexter's victims. As a result, I always lie there thinking of all the bad deeds I have ever done, which is something bound to leave you feeling sad and guilty rather than lovely and relaxed.
