A Christmas Plop

Last Thursday was a little gem of Christmas plopped square into the middle of Spa Massage. I got "cornered" into doing a hot stone massage finally. I've been paranoid about having to fulfill this requirement since we started the class. With pretty much no practice, I had visions of me knocking my client out with a large stone dancing through my head. (Read about the origin of my paranoia HERE.) Despite my initial jitteriness, it went fantastically well--I had the girl laughing so hard a couple times that her sacral stone almost fell off. And despite burning my palms a bit (I am lazy and didn't feel like scooping the stones out with a spoon since it takes forever--the scalding hot temperature apparently catches up to your skin eventually), it was a damn enjoyable experience. On her survey, she noted that she would change absolutely nothing about the experience, that she "Absolutely loved it." And I walked out of there with a $20 tip. I'm not uber-materialistic, and I don't like to gloat on the amount of tips I make. But after the whole tip-less Man-Boob Experience, it just signified to me that maybe I'm not so horrible a massage therapist after all.

Santa blessed us with even more good tidings afterwards--our only 9 pm client didn't show, so we were able to hold our potluck earlier than planned (we'd been planning to hang around after clinic, til about 11, to gorge). We all converged in the back massage room, a sheet draped over the massage table like a table cloth, our tasty grub strewn all about, and we chatted and goofed around for the final hour. Someone made vegan chili. Folks were surprised to find that they actually *LIKED* something as weird as couscous (last week, I found out no one there had ever *HAD* couscous and several folks had never even heard of it--so after S____ said, Oh hey! Isn't couscous the stuff that Rachel on Friends talked about eating with her hands in that one episode? I decided to bring it in along with cookies). And people tried not to look like big fat fatties by only eating 3 or 4 of my cookies, despite begging me to let them take some leftovers along with them (presumably to stuff their faces with on the drive home).

All in all, I felt good driving home. I've really come to like my classes this semester and grow fond of the folks in them. I'm gonna miss them next semester.

Damn you, Father Time (and people unable to pass anatomy).