Send in the Clowns

The hubster and I decided to give massotherapy a try over our anniversary getaway weekend.

As spa virgins, we were anxious about the rules of etiquette.

Because we are two people who will spend a good half hour debating whether or not to tip the airport shuttle driver (And if so, how much? Should we slip it to him during a handshake or just run up and throw all our change in his hand? What if the exchange is fumbled and our meager contribution ends up on the ground? We would never be able to ride the airport shuttle again, etc., etc.), we spent a great deal of time before our scheduled spa appointment discussing various scenarios.

The P-Dog, for example, was prepared to don his bathrobe whilst in our hotel room, then hoof it through the series of interconnected tunnels that lead from the hotel to the spa in his robe and slippers. We discussed this for at least ten minutes before deciding it’s possible they may have robes for us to change into at the spa and darn it all to heck, we’ll just go in our street clothes.

But.

To shower or not to shower?

To shave or not to shave?

And the biggest question of all:

Rimarama: Are you going to take your pants off?”

P-Dog: “Are you?”

Rimarama: “What if you accidentally pitch a tent?”

Silence.

P-Dog: “I don’t think that’s likely.”

Rimarama: I’m afraid that you'll pitch a tent and that I'll fart. If I am, in fact, able to achieve a state of relaxation.

P-Dog: I guess that’s possible.

Rimarama: Are you insinuating that I would fart during my massage?

And so forth.

On the morning of our appointment, we presented ourselves in the spa reception area, where we were greeted by an attendant who gave us detailed instructions about where each of us was to go and what each of us was to do.

Instructions to which I paid no nevermind because I was too busy trying to decide if I was going to stay in my skivvies or not and fretting over the possibility that the P-Dog might inadvertently pitch a tent. I was prepared to die of embarrassment for him if this should happen, even though he appeared to be untroubled by the possibility.

In the ladies locker room, I was handed a pair of child size slippers in a size five and a half (oh, the injustice!), a one-size-fits-all-except-me robe, a plastic bag I considered puking into, and a locker key.

Once in my spa duds, I really had no idea where to go or what to do. The person who gave me the robe and slippers was nowhere in sight, and I seemed to recall something about meeting up with the P-Dog in the communal area, so I embarked on a little tour.



I got lost and ended up in the bowels of spaland, where I saw some frightening things:

What in God's Name are those nozzles for?

Eventually, an employee found me. She seemed a little skeptical (“Are you sure that’s what they told you?”) when I explained that I had been instructed to come down here and wait for my husband in this here communal area, but she went ahead and summoned him forth from the actual communal area, where he had been contentedly sipping green tea and munching on an apple like a model client.


Once our massages got underway, things went very smoothly. The massage therapists were consummate professionals and I am happy to report that the underwear dilemma turned out to be a non-issue.


I was so relaxed, that when I tried to speak up to tell the massage therapist what a great job she was doing, my words came out all garbled up. Then I just gave up and smiled into my face pillow for the remainder of the session.


It was awesome.