Ann
Ipock
Humorist,
author, speaker
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Georgetown
Times
Valentine's Day Discussion
By Ann Ipock February 20, 2008
My friend Laura and I were discussing Valentine's Day last week. When I told her that Russell and I were celebrating by giving each other massages, she seemed surprised.
"Well, I knew you said Russell gave wonderful foot rubs. But you also said he is super ticklish, so how will that work out?"
It's true. While sitting in his manly-man recliner, if I even brush past his bare sensitive feet, he jumps, followed by firm orders, "Watch it!" But if I really want to tease him -- or rather, I should say, get him to stop teasing me -- I have this routine: I reach up to his neck with both of my hands and he goes crazy. With no contact at all by me, he squirms and laughs out loud.
Of course, this actually makes him rather endearing, even boyish, as opposed to that grumpy, hard-as-rocks order, "Watch it!"
I explained this to Laura. "Oh, no, honey. You've got it wrong. We are giving each other gift certificates for massage." She had a point. I couldn't believe Russell came to me with the idea. He's been saying for years that a massage is the last thing in the world he'd ever want. It turns out an interesting, progressive and open-minded lady -- no, I'm not talking about me -- convinced him he'd absolutely love a massage. I'm sure all of us wives have experienced the same thing at one time or other. We beg our hubbies to try something new, promising they'll enjoy it, and they just tune us out. But Connie had his attention at the right place and the right time. He came home, handed me the business card and said, "What do you think?" instead of the old, "What are you thinking?" that I'd been hearing him say for years.
So off we went on Valentine's night to our sweet, gentle, but extremely talented Natallia. Don't let my description fool you though -- she was one talented masseuse who went to work with great enthusiasm and kneaded, rubbed, manipulated, brushed (with a towel) and worked my muscles until I thought I was just going to fly out of the room ... um, I mean levitate out of the room.
There was a slight language barrier, though, since Natallia is Russian and has been in the states for less than five years. And since Russia produces some of the world's top professionals -- including doctors, models, gymnasts and writers -- I shouldn't have been surprised. Anyway, Natallia and I both more than made up for it with our "signals." Mine was mostly audible moaning and hers was mostly supportive words, like "velcome, mees onn" each time I moaned.
Perhaps that was one of the biggest surprises -- to have a rather "quiet" massage compared to my previous "chatty" massages.
See, y'all know that I tend to talk a little -- OK, a lot. And though I know it's better to remain QUIET (just like in the library), I can't help but ask, "So where are you from? Where did you go to school? How long have you lived here? Can you move into my house for on-call 24-hour available massages?" But in this case, I had to stop talking. I was not only impressed, I was inspired. And since I've had well over 100 massages in my life, I think I can speak with some authority (even though some folks never listen, and others doubt the part about authority).
But the real pièce de rèsistance was Russell. Y'all, I tried to find a Russian word to express exaltation, but have you ever looked at the Russian alphabet? Anyway, Russell was flat-out, 100-percent won over. He couldn't stop talking about how overjoyed (which says a lot, since "Russell" and "joy" are rarely in the same sentence) he was with Natallia's massage.
We had indeed found our perfect Valentine's gift for each other.
Later, each in our altered mental status, we floated over to the nearby restaurant, dined on nachos and margaritas and sealed the deal. Massages will definitely be future Valentine's gifts to each other, and maybe other holidays as well. I'm thinking there's nine certifiable holidays each year, plus a birthday, the anniversary, and if you add one for good measure, that's 12 -- one for each month. That's a good thing because he has lots of years to catch up on.