Spa stories &
other small joys.

I went to a spa to "relax" and cried about a 5-year-old email instead.

A highly accurate timeline of me lying very still under cucumber slices while my brain rehearsed an apology to my college roommate's stepdad. We need to talk about why "doing nothing" makes us so unwell.

Listen. I'd like to walk you through something, and I'd like you to promise not to judge me — not because I did anything that bad, but because if you judge me, I will spiral, and I have a lot of laundry I'm already not folding.

On a Tuesday in March, for reasons that felt very urgent and now feel deeply unhinged, I booked myself a 90-minute facial. The kind with the steam tent. The kind where they put the little robe on you and pretend the slippers are one-size-fits-all. I told my husband it was "for my mental health," which is a phrase I have now used to justify, in chronological order: this facial, a $42 candle, three throw pillows, and an entire weekend in Niagara.

The setup, or: "how hard can it be"

The receptionist handed me a clipboard. On the clipboard was a form. The form asked me — and I quote, in my memory, which is admittedly not a primary source — "What is your intention for today's session?" Reader. My intention. I am a grown woman. I have a mortgage. I have a child who is currently in a phase where he will only eat foods that are "white." I do not have an intention. I have a list of unread group chats and a vague sense that my mother is mad at me.

I wrote: "Relax." The esthetician (let's call her Lana, because that was her name) read it, nodded sagely, and led me to a room that smelled like a forest had been put through a diffuser. She told me to "make myself comfortable" and left. The lights dimmed. A flute came on. I made myself comfortable.

The chaos, in real time

What follows is a highly accurate timeline of the first 22 minutes of my "relaxing" facial.

• 0:00 — I close my eyes. I am ready. I am here. I am present. The flute is going. The flute is doing its best.
• 0:42 — I remember I left a load of darks in the washer. They have been there since Sunday. It is now Tuesday. They are a colony.
• 2:15 — Lana applies something cold to my forehead. It is nice. Briefly, I am a person.
• 4:08 — I remember I never replied to my friend Dana's text about her dog. The dog is fine. The dog has been fine. Dana sent me the picture in October.
• 6:30 — I begin composing a reply to Dana in my head. It is too long. I start over. It is now an essay. I begin to sweat under the cucumbers.
• 9:22 — I remember an email I sent in 2019 to my college roommate's stepdad. I do not remember what was in it. I only remember that I sent it. I begin to suspect it was bad.
• 11:50 — A single, hot, ridiculous tear escapes the cucumber and rolls into my ear.
• 14:14 — Lana, gently: "Just relax."
• 14:15 — Me, internally: WITH WHAT, LANA.

"Just relax," she said. As if the word "relax" wasn't the original sin of my entire generation of women.

The mental load is a real load

Here is the thing nobody tells you about being a woman somewhere between 25 and 50: the inside of your head is not a room. It is a Costco on a Saturday. It is full of carts. The carts contain things like "call Mom," and "is the basil dying," and "did I sign the permission slip," and "why did Brenda from work say my hair looked 'fun' today, what did she mean by FUN." You cannot just turn this off by lying down. The carts keep rolling. Sometimes they roll over a flute.

I used to think the goal of self-care was to find a quiet room and sit in it. Now I think the goal of self-care is to find a quiet room and let every single ridiculous thought I've been suppressing for six months come out, in order, like passengers off a delayed flight. And then, when they're all out, I get the facial.

What I'd tell you, if we were having a glass of wine

If you've been putting off booking a consultation — for a facial, for a haircut, for the weird mole, for anything — because you don't have time to "relax," I'm here to tell you that relaxation is not the prerequisite. Relaxation is the byproduct. The prerequisite is just showing up and being weird about it.

Cry under your cucumbers. Compose an apology email to a man you have not seen since 2014. Make a mental grocery list. Whisper a secret to your esthetician. This is allowed. This is, in fact, the whole point.

And then, when it's done and you're back in your car in the parking lot, you'll do what I did, which is sit there for eleven minutes with the engine off, looking absolutely fantastic, and finally — finally — text Dana back.

Your turn. What is the most chaotic thought you've ever had while pretending to relax? Tell me in the comments, or whisper it to your nearest cucumber. We're all in this together.