I am headed to a new masseuse today; a luxury I rarely allow myself to have.  One, I get pretty bad nightmares after I go, and two, its truly in my mind a luxury item.  And I don’t allow myself many of those; possibly because I am mother, but probably more along the lines that I have an awesome sense of guilt.

Whenever I head to something new, I try to have a pretend conversation in my car with the person I am going to meet.  I imagine the questions they will ask, and try to determine what my answers are going to be well before I arrive.  Two issues with this, one the questions are never the same as the ones actually asked, and two, other drivers tend to look at you like you are a complete idiot when you have pretend conversations with yourself.  And unfortunately I don’t own one of those blue tooth hickeys to put in my ear to make it look a little more legit.  Putting one of those things in my ears seems to be like enabling the madness.  Really there is already plenty there.

I am going to a pseudo friend for this massage.  She is a pseudo friend, in that I know her, admire her, can and do, freely speak to her when she is around, but I wouldn’t necessarily call her up to chat.  I had been researching Chinese and Japanese ancient practices, and mentioned that I wanted to try a Reiki massage.  Lo and behold, this pseudo was practiced in the art.  And there I went.

My pseudo friend (I like that word better than acquaintance), is an amazing woman.  She has a full and active life, two children under six, a thriving practice, and she just recently won the battle over breast cancer.  That last would be significant in and of itself, but when you add the day-to-day of her life, I find the victory over that war extraordinary.  And yet, not counting the glow, she is incredibly real.

But she does have this glow.  I don’t know her well enough to know if she received the glow at birth, after living a certain amount of years, after the births of her children, or after the war I watched her wage.  She lost a breast, her hair, and probably a good part of her dignity and self-confidence, yet I swear the woman has a glow.  And truthfully, when I am not blinded by admiration, I am in awe.

So there I was in the car, imagining my conversation with the pseudo friend.  I imagined like all masseuse she is going to ask where I want to concentrate on.  And I thought about.  The normal answer would be to say my shoulders, since they are hard as bricks and tend to be the single place that I store and hold all my stress, anger, and hurt.  My alternate and somewhat channeling ancient warriors answer would be my Qi (Chi) is out of whack and I am suffering the aches and pains from that.  My scientific answer might be that I am nauseous every morning and I need to work on that, or that I have horrible tremors that move through my joints that make it difficult to walk, to talk and sometimes to simply stand still.  Or I could just say, hell if I know, it’s all a mess. From my brain to my feet and every where in between, it is literally a disaster.

I like pushing the envelope when it comes to my well-being.  I have been known to try such new things as bikram yoga (hot yoga), meditation, ab gliders and journaling. (yes, I know the last doesn’t work with the rest, but go with me – it is my post).  I like pushing the envelope because each and every time there is the small amount of hope that I will find that miracle cure.  I am one of those people who spends thousands of dollars on creams, washes, tools, and ridiculous other products the beauty world promises will cure all my woes.  I spend money on equipment, visits, and other one time deals hoping that somehow that will cure the problem; although I can admit most of the problem is I simply look at myself and see something wrong.

But I am trying a different tack this year; call it my new year’s resolution. This year, I am going to simply stick with what I know works.  An hour a month for a massage, walks outside that hopefully I can again turn to runs (cross your fingers).  I have promised myself no new miracles, no matter how good the marketing, and I am going to sincerely try to remember to take things like my multi-vitamin, eat healthy, and get off the couch.

I am no good at promising I will go to the gym, I won’t do that minute I am away from people who can judge me.  But I can bring my clothes to work, walk on the nature trail and feel embarrassed when I bring my clothes and don’t use them.  I never find anything that works miracles on my zits, my cellulite, or my fat.  So, this year I am switching back to nature.  (See my beauty blog for more on that).  And this year, I am going to win some wars so that I can get that incredible glow that the beautiful woman who will put her hands all over me has naturally.  Hell, maybe I will just sit on her table today and simply point my finger at her and say, I want to be you; make me you. Here’s to glowing like a worm!