church of the spa

To conclude a New Moms' class at church last night, we mommies were provided with a "special treat" as the class leader called it. It happened sorta like this...I walk in and a sweet woman I've never met harpoons me with one of those aromatic, just-warmed-in-the-microwave neck pillows and hands me a tub that she informs me will be used for my "foot soak". Ummm... Before I can protest, a fellow mama walks in, sits down next to me, eyes my neckwear suspiciously and asks if I'm "okay". I reply, "Don't worry, you'll get your own here in a few seconds." Then comes the tub of water for my toe bath. Now, being the middle of winter and since the little piggies are usually clothed this time of year, I've been letting my toenails air out. During the summer, I keep the nails painted with varying shades of polish and consequently, they end up turning yellow and dry and brittle. Yuck. (You ladies know what i'm talking about.) Once the weather turns chilly and the flipflops are in the closet for a few months, the toenail polish goes bye-bye. My toenails are finally healthy again but they're extremely self-conscious about hanging out naked in front of the general public. Well, I ended up sharing my foot bath with my friend next to me, who, might I add, even though it's the middle of winter AND she's pregnant, has on bright orange polish. The mom on the other side of me complimented her on her "cute toes" and asked if she'd recently had a pedicure, all the while eyeing my toes as well. My shy, reticent, naked toes. In the background, I hear the spa lady telling us how we can hire her to do a spa party at our house, etc. Don't know that church is really the place I want to go to have someone try to sell their product to me, but anyways...moving on.

Then we wipe off our lipstick and put on some lip exfoliator using the same applicator. Yes, that's right. We all use the SAME applicator. Hello unsanitary. She pokes the applicator down in the goo and then everyone uses their unwashed fingers to take the goo off the applicator and apply to their lips. I'm a little bit of a germaphobe, and this kind of thing is my worst nightmare. I'm not kidding. Then she hands out these moist eye pads (think non-perishable cucumber slices), has us cover our eyes, and tells us to sit back and relax (in our folding chairs...on a linoleum floor...under flourescent lights...in a drafty portable shelter...with three or four babies crying in the background...oh so relaxing). By this time I had decided to forego the foot baptism, especially since I scalded my toesies on initial immersion. So there I am with my sweaty neck pillow, gritty lip goo, and shifting eye pads, pondering how many cooties I just transferred from the community applicator to my lips...relaxing. No one's talking. We're relaxing. We're all relaxing. Finally, I decide to flip over my eye pads. I take them off and glance up and all the other women in the room are just sitting there with their eye pads off, waiting for me and this one other lady. Wow. Not feelin' so relaxed anymore. It was about this time that I started wishing I had gone grocery-shopping instead of going to church.