Pride and Portliness

This is probably going to sound incredibly self indulgent.

Because of muscle spasms I get that can knock me off my feet, wake me up at night and sometimes make it impossible to get out of bed in the morning, I go for a massage about once a week or so.

ACK! I can hear you all now, ‘cry me a river’, ‘you poor thing’, ‘well aren’t you special’, all dripping with sarcasm. But it isn’t like it sounds.

First of all, I go to a chain spa with discounted prices. I am a member, so that reduces the price even more. It is not a fancy place, just a simple set up. I have only been going since I started my new job in July. And, finally, there is never a minute that I don’t fully appreciate how lucky I am to have both the time and the money to do this.

Believe it or not, I don’t even enjoy it that much. It takes time, I have to get naked, it is usually a different therapist each time and everyone is has a different technique. I mean it feels ok, but it is all about relieving the pain for me.

I went tonight and it is a therapist I have never met before. A really sweet young girl. She tells me she read my chart and asks if there is anything special I need. I tell her no, I just can’t have any pressure on my lower back at all. She says, “OK. Do you need a towel for your chest?”

Excuse me??????????

No one has ever asked me this question before, so I am confused and don’t know how to answer. Because I am a mental case, I want to get the answer right. God forbid the massage therapist thinks I am stupid. I think about my chest. It’s under me when I am lying face down and it is under the sheet when I am lying on my back, so when would I use the towel? I’m running the possibilities through my head like a Rolodex. I am tempted to check my chest for moisture that perhaps she can see but I can’t feel. However, I am reluctant to feel myself up in front of a stranger.

I briefly consider bluffing my way out of it, but decide to just fess up. “My chest…?”

She replies, “Yes, because, you know…”

Um, no, actually I don’t. But I am starting to sweat, because I didn’t know there was going to be a test .

She continues, “….some women are more comfortable when there is a towel around their chest when they are lying down.”

Behind the Jeopardy theme music playing in my head, a light bulb is starting to go off. “Yikes!” I say to her, “Don’t tell me it’s written somewhere I have big boobs!” and I gave a nervous laugh like, they wouldn’t, would they?!?!

“Oh no!” she chuckles, as if that is the most preposterous thing in the world, and I start to breathe a sigh of relief.

“It just says ‘top heavy’.”

Oh. My. God.

I can feel my face get hot and I want the floor to swallow me and my apparently freakishly enormous bosom. But that doesn’t happen. The floor stays solid. I don’t disappear into oblivion as I want to do. And now I have to take my clothes off and unleash the Breasts That Swallowed Pittsburgh.

Once I am lying on the table with my face in the little cradle, the tears start. Fortunately, they drip right through the opening unnoticed. I am so embarrassed I just want to go home and curl up under the covers. Better yet, under the bed. Even better still, under the floor boards.

Shit, just dig a hole and bury me.






Two things occur to me:

1) I apparently am way too prideful and need continual lessons in humility.

2) Maybe hanging onto this memory I will finally lose weight.