Better Than Sex

I had the best foot massage of my life today. Well, except maybe for the fact that it didn’t last long enough, I was in public, and a T.V. was blasting in the background.

I called my Mom around noon (cause I was in need of a little Mom time) and she offered to take me to our special “Temple to Talk” (a.k.a. Taco Bell.) When I got to her house, she was working on her newest scrapbook of her recent tour of England. “This is my blog book” she said proudly, and I was impressed with how professional and creative it was. I can’t wait till she’s done - I’m going to bring all four cardboard boxes of my photos over to her house and let ‘er have at it.

On the way to Taco Bell, my mother asked me, “How would you like it if I took you to get a pedicure instead?” Seeing as how I’ve been to Taco Bell about a zillion times, and I’ve only had four pedicures in my life, the decision was not hard to make. We chose one of those Asian sweat shop type places that welcome walk-ins and seem to be popping up all over town. When we walked in we were hit hard with the smell of polish remover and other chemicals, a stifling heat, and a crowd of people. I was starting to rethink my decision.

It was not long before a tiny Asian woman approached from the back. We told her we wanted two pedicures and asked her if there was much of a wait. She told us it would only be ten minutes, we were both surprised. Every chair was full and, interestingly enough, a tough looking biker dude, covered in tattoos appeared to be waiting. Clearly not the “metro-sexual” type, I assumed his bitch was nearby having her claws shellacked.

My mother and I told the woman we would be back, then left in a hurry commenting to each other (apparently too loudly) that it was hot and stunk in there. When we returned the minutes later, the door had been closed and the air was on. In contrast to the man waiting as we left, a totally metro-sexual man was sitting at manicure’s table preparing to have his nails done. I couldn’t help but admire him for being there. (I later found out his girlfriend was there too and she had drug him in.)

Two of the four other times I have had a pedicure it was at Lyle’s College of Beauty (which my son calls L.C.O.B). They use old, pink, plastic kitchen sink tubs and all the girls wear too much makeup and smell like cigarettes. This place had these big, vibrating chairs with little whorl pools for your feet. I’d been in one like it before, but I didn’t expect it here. As soon as I sat down the massage bars in the chair were turned on and cranked up. I could hear my back cracking in relief.

As a woman pampered my feet, and a man worked on my mother’s next to me, the pair began some friendly chit-chat with each of us. The trouble is, they didn’t speak very loudly, VH-1 was blaring near-by, and they each had very thick accents. My poor mother in her hearing aid was straining to understand. I wasn’t having much luck either.

Hoping to change the subject I asked if they knew where the tropical island represented in a wallpaper patchwork was supposed to be. “Hawaii,” I was told. “Huh?” I responded. Then the man said that it looks a lot like Vietnam. Putting two and two together I said, “Oh that looks like Vietnam? Are you from there?” “Yes, I was born in Saigon.” They then began to tell us about the poor people in Vietnam and the types of houses they live in. (I was really starting to feel guilty to have this woman scrub my heels for only thirteen bucks.)

About that time I heard a strange slapping sound, a looked over to find metro-sexual being pounded on by another Vietnamese woman. Furiously she beat on his shoulders and arms with one tiny fist and the other held flat. My mother and I looked at each other in surprise and started to laugh. Neither of us had ever seen anything like that before. The Vietnamese couple laughed back at us and told us they would show us how it was done. Not long later the woman was massaging lotion all the way from the top of my calves to the bottoms of my feet. I wanted to melt into the chair. About that type she grabbed my leg and began beating on the muscle. It felt amazing, but seeing as how I have skinny chicken legs, her work made a funny, loud popping sound and soon everyone was looking and laughing at me.

I’m not sure if my pedicurist was just more efficient, if the male pedicurist did a more thorough job, or if my mother had some tough ol’ hooves to negotiate, but I my pedicure was over a good fifteen minutes before hers was. I wanted more foot rubs.

As I watched my mother laugh while a man beat on her calves, I thought to myself, “We need to do this more often.” Thanks Mom!

P.S. Did you know the word ‘often’ is pronounced without the t, which is silent? The correct pronunciation is “off’n” It’s true. Look it up.

P.P.S (Added by my son, who helped edit this for me and has an unusual interest in all things linguistic, and drives me crazy cuz half the time I don’t know what he’s talking.)