Mall Massage

If there’s one thing that sets man apart from beast, I think it’s one’s willingness to receive a massage in the mall.  I’ve had a growing concern in recent months that my husband has taken too much of a liking to this practice and it is getting worse. He has made his disdain for shopping well known to me in our years together and generally I don’t make him accompany me.  But sometimes it is unavoidable.  The way he has chosen to put up with having to be dragged inside a shopping mall is to stop at those little dog-and-pony stands in the middle of the mall where they have a series of massage chairs set up. 

The problem with these set-ups is that you have no idea what kind of sweaty, obese person has drooled all over the chair prior to your arrival.  Sure, the workers place what I’m sure is a very sanitary paper towel over the cushion where you insert your face, but germs have a way of creeping.  Plus, it’s all so public.  The passersby can glance over and wonder who the weirdo is who is willing to plop down in the middle of a shopping mall and get a rubdown on a chair in which countless similar weirdoes have plopped.  And if you are, in fact, able to relax in such an environment, your face is all smushed up against the cushion so that when you are finished and sit up, you have the problem of a tell-tale red mark on your face.  Possibly your eyebrows are now misshapen due to the way you were positioned.  You look ridiculous and you then have to walk the length of the mall to get back to the parking lot.  

So the past few times we have had to go to the mall, I have suggested that he drop me off and go run an errand of his own.  There is a golf shop very close by and even a Lowes and Home Depot.  Where he used to jump all over an arrangement like that, he’s begun changing his tune and saying he’ll just get a massage while he waits for me.  It used to embarrass me to have to retrieve him from that area once my shopping was complete.  Now, there is a new problem.  While there is still that massage area in the mall, there is a new “store” that you can walk into discreetly.  A backroom if you will.  He can disappear behind a curtain and get a chair massage, foot massage and who knows what else. 

You’d think I would be appreciative of not having to publicly approach the idiot in the massage chair and claim him as my husband, and I am.  But now he’s getting 30-45 minute massages and I usually have an errand which takes about 10 minutes.  I am now having to wait for HIM at the mall.  What’s worse; I too, am a sucker for a massage.  I, too, have received a middle-of-the-mall chair massage that I am not proud of.  I happened past one on a day when I had a crick in my neck.  I made a hasty decision to stop and before I could come to my senses and run away, I was in a chair with a burly Asian woman pounding on my neck and shoulders.

I never could relax during that experience.  For one, these mall massages are not the relaxing, aromatherapy, hot stone massages that I am used to.  They use some Asian torture techniques that I am unfamiliar with to beat away your pain and cause a new, different pain.  And two, I knew that I would have to eventually stand up from the chair and be seen by whomever happened to be around at that moment.  What if it was a coworker who thought I was smarter than that?  What if it was a neighbor who thought I was more refined than that?  What if it was a total stranger who just thought I was weird and gross?  I did manage to get up, pay, and make my mortified escape without running into to anyone I knew, but it was humiliating nonetheless.

So now that it is in a more discreet location, I will be more apt to succumb to its beckoning seduction.  Let’s face it.  I love massages.  Some people are creeped out about being rubbed on by a stranger, but not me.  The way I figure it is that it’s just like a doctor’s office.  This is their job.  They’ve seen better bodies.  They’ve seen worse bodies.  They’ve had better groomed people.  They’ve had some gross people.  I’m happily somewhere in the middle.  I have found someone I love that I go to regularly.  If I have forgotten to shave my legs, I just apologize and we move on.  It’s great.  I have no idea if she goes and tells her colleagues how ragged and disgusting I am after I leave but I don’t care.  She gets paid and I get to relax.  

I don’t feel any shame or discomfort in getting a massage.  There’s not much I wouldn’t do to get one.  I always feel like I need one.  If I had an endless supply of money, I would get one at least weekly.  I don’t care if it’s a man or a woman doing it.  I don’t care if my undies have holes in them and they will be seen.  I’m not even that concerned if I haven’t showered yet that day.  Whatever.  Whenever.  Pretty much, I’d stop just short of pleasuring a hobo to get a massage.  But there’s something about the mall.  The fact that you are on display.  The fact that you have no idea what measures are taken to be clean and sanitary.  It makes me a little uneasy.

What I haven’t told you yet about my marriage is that Mike and I are not a competitive couple.  If he has a guys’ trip; if I have a girls’ night out – we don’t compare notes to determine who is somehow getting the short end of the stick.  Unless a massage is involved.  If I get one, he feels owed.  If he gets one, I’m on the phone making my own appointment.  It got to the point several years ago that we had to implement a rule and it is: If you get a massage, you are excused from having to give one to your spouse that day.   It started because the un-massaged party would be resentful and say something like, “Well YOU got a massage today so YOU should have to rub MY feet tonight!”  It began to take the pleasure out of the massage, so we had to do something to preserve the relaxation that should come with that glorious, glorious massage.  We take that rule seriously.  It’s up there with You-Can’t-Ever-Cheat-On-Me rule.  Might even be more important.

I bring all of this up because we were at the mall yesterday.  I had told Mike that the girls and I needed to make one return and get him a gift for his upcoming birthday.  Perfect, he explained. He’d go with us and get a massage.  Immediately I got my back up (if you’ll pardon the pun).  Why should he get a massage?  Maybe I’m stressed out too.  Did he ever think of that?  I don’t like a mall massage but I’ll de damned if I’m not getting one!  So for far too long a time, we carefully laid out our shopping strategy - how many minutes he would get massaged versus how long it would take me to go return an item, buy another item and get back for a 12 minute beat down.  Plus, there was the matter of having our kids with us.  What would they do while we were getting the life pounded out of us?  It didn’t matter.  Kids don’t have to have constant entertainment.  They can sit there and be quiet while their parents smash their faces against the flu virus that has probably been breathed repeatedly into the cushiony face pillow.  

So, we had our plan and we were ready.  I had my reservations about the mall-ssage, sure.  But I had been overtaken by the exuberance one feels when they know one is on the horizon.  I couldn’t get there fast enough.  We dropped Mike off and went about our errands.  It actually took longer than I had planned.  It dawned on me that the girls needed new shoes so we stopped at a couple of stores only to strike out.  After a decent trek around the length of the mall, we returned to the Asian Torture Chamber And Massage Parlor. 

The workers were all too eager to see us coming.  Time to get our aggression out, they thought.  I went back to Mike’s chair and asked him how much time he had left.  For that would determine if I was to get 12 minutes or 25.  He said he was almost done so I opted for 12.  I immediately sat down a planted my face in the disease-ridden pillow.  Then it dawned on me – my kids.  So, I popped back up and asked my masseuse where they could sit.  In very broken English, she said they could sit on a sofa that was stained (Stained?  From what?!!) behind us.  Works for me. 

It began.  The pushing.  The smashing.  The pounding.  It was uncomfortable but I felt like it was something I needed to drive the stress from my body.  A few minutes into it, Mike informed me that he was done and was headed to get a foot massage.  Go ahead and get the 25 minutes, he instructed.  Done and done.  Score!  The beating continued.  A few times, she was rubbing me so hard that it made me cough.  I think she had found and was massaging my lungs.  As she would press, my face would bury itself farther and farther into the tainted pillow.  How is it that these petite Asian women are so powerful?  This person looked like she would float away if the wind blew and here she was about to drive her hand so far into my back that it would pop through my stomach.  I was in pain.  But it was like that John Cougar song – it Hurt So Good. 

As it always happens with these mall-ssages, I couldn’t ever really relax.  What germs are in this pillow and now all over my face?  Who sweated all over this chair before me?  Are my faded, badly-in-need-of-repair granny panties visible?  Why is this woman trying to kill me?  And what is she saying to her coworkers?  That’s always a little disconcerting – the fact that you cannot understand what they are saying to each other.  Halfway through my massage another shameless moron who had made the same ill-advised decision that Mike and I had made ended up in the chair right next to mine.  At that point, my masseuse began speaking, in her native language, to her colleague.  A few times they broke into laughter.  My panties must be visible.  They are laughing because of how huge they are.  God, is my crack exposed?  Who cares – I’m getting a massage, however uncomfortable it may be. 

When it mercifully came to an end, I stood up, tried to comb my eyebrows into place with my fingertips, and walked over to get the girls and make my way to pay.  Mike was still getting his feet rubbed (by a man, I should mention).  I paid for everything – only $75 for essentially an hour and a half of services for us both.  There it is.  That’s the reason we do it.  It’s quick – no appointment needed (because who else does this in a mall?!?!); it’s easy (unless you count the bruising); and it’s relatively inexpensive.  You can slink out of the shop instead of having to stand up from the chair in the middle of the mall in front of everyone.  It works out for everyone.  Of course, I’m very sore today and it remains to be seen what illnesses I’ve contracted.  But it was totally worth it.  And I feel like we have taught our daughters a very valuable lesson – It is always a good idea to have a total stranger in a questionable environment rub on your body IF – and here’s the moral – IF it is reasonably priced.  You should always, ALWAYS take that deal. 

I will leave you with a quote.  Lyrics from American Treasure Johnny Gill from his lovely 80’s ballad Rub You The Right Way:

Can you feel the magic in my hands
When I touch and rub you the right way
Stroke applied with tenderness
When I hold and rub you the right way

Yes I can, Johnny.  Yes I can.