Naked and afraid (Part III)

My time was up: A tiny Korean woman was calling my locker number. Her costume, disheveled hair, navel-high black underwear briefs, black sports bra and multi-colored striped socks peeking from plastic shower shoes, lent her a Hausfrau-meets-Dominatrix-meets-Rainbow Brite sort of persona.

“Good luck,” Cat purred from the Jacuzzi.

Oh boy.

I secured my towel and followed my host into an adjacent hallway To the left and right were semi-partitioned treatment stations, each featuring a knee-high massage table encased in the kind of thick, durable plastic my friend’s grandparents use to protect their couch from radioactive meltdowns.  Hoses snaked from the tiled walls into overflowing industrial-sized garbage cans positioned halfway between every two stations. Shallow buckets floated on top.

“Here,” the woman said, indicating the first table on the right.

“Do I take my towel off?” I asked. But I already knew the answer. Droplets of water, I noticed, beaded on the table; this was going to be a fairly wet experience.

I surrendered my towel to a peg and settled down on the table much in the way you’d expect a self-conscious, naked Nearly Never Nude to settle down upon wet plastic.

“First time,” I said, craning my neck to track the therapist’s movements at the foot of the table. She laughed – and then flung a bucket of warm water over me that traveled like a wave from my toes to shoulders. My butt cheeks clenched. If someone lodged a pencil between them, I reckoned I now possessed enough grip to write with it.

My “Pure Bliss” treatment involved multiple bucket dousings before the therapist donned a Brillo pad disguised as an exfoliating mitt. She grabbed my right leg. She grabbed my left leg. She slid my quivering limbs apart across the wet plastic. More butt clenching. And then she descended.

Aside from the too-close attention paid to my inner thighs and the entire passage of time I spent face-up on that table, the overall experience wasn’t unpleasant; after scrubbing me raw, the therapist progressed to the Full Body Moisturizing Massage component. Then the High Quality Lavender/Mint Aroma Oil. I pondered the color of the Refreshing Vitamin C Face Masque (I guessed pea green). I confess to relishing the Scalp Massage.

Once Cat settled onto her own Slip and Slide three stations down, the partitions separating us concealed all but her disembodied head. I attempted to catch her eye, to flash her a smile that said, “I’m OK. This isn’t half bad,” but her eyes were closed as she succumbed to the scrubbing phase of “Pure Bliss.” I watched her head bob up and down with each thrust of the Brillo pad.

The 90-minute treatment concluded with the therapist tying my hair in a knot, a hand towel burritoed around my ponytail and twisted into submission. Kelsey and Cat sported similar styles when they emerged from their treatments. Jackie’s headgear resembled an Indian rumal, and she seemed slightly envious of our knots.

My girlfriends and I re-congregated within the Himalayan Salt Room to share our experiences. Snuggled between two patrons mounting each other’s backs to administer post-massage massages and the uptight, twiggy patron whose swaddled lower half, visible ribs and outstretched hands bore an uncanny likeness to a certain religious figure, we giggled and laughed. We slipped back into our clothes and resumed regarding one another beyond locked eyes. Jackie French braided our hair. We carpooled to downtown Palo Alto and dined ravenously on Indian food – followed by gelato.

So this is the end of this bloviated account, a tale one of my five readers aptly described as “a tease.” At this point, I’m expected to sum up the Korean Spa Episode by attesting to the joys of parading naked in front of one’s friends and undergoing butt-clenching scrub downs administered by strangers in rainbow socks. I’m now liberated and more comfortable in my own skin and considering a side career as a pole dancer and---. False. The truth is, my back has since developed a rash, and I’m still frightened by my pale, knobby, flat-chested body. Lest my girlfriends think me an ungrateful bitch, however, I will quickly add that I am thankful for the adventure and the opportunity to bond with them. I might even do it all again – but not alone.

So, in summary, I’d like to embrace Cat, Jackie and Kelsey and thank them for putting up with all my bellyaching. I just need to throw on some clothes first before I do so.