Touch

My mother always told me the importance of touch; hugging, putting a hand on someones arm, rubbing someones shoulders. She was a touchy, huggy mom. So, when I left my parents home in 1998 for college, my mom told me that I needed to hug someone everyday. (Now you know where I get it. I was raised by a hugging hippy and I LOVE IT!) But, I realize it's not for everyone.

Yesterday, I was supposed to meet a friend for early afternoon coffee, but when she called to let me know she was feeling a under the weather- between flying to Europe and then, on to the West coast, she needed the rest- and I made a last minute decision to get a massage.

I would get a massage every week if I could afford it, and unfortunately, I haven't had one since my birthday last March. (No, I don't count Chris rubbing my back for ten minutes before bed as a real massage. But I will gladly continue to be the recipient. It just doesn't count.)

It was kind of a spiritual experience for me, yesterday. Rose was her name and it may have just been the best massage ever, or maybe I was just ripe for it. It was the right moment. Inhale. Exhale. Release. The physicality of it is the majority of what enjoying a massage is about. But there's also the emotional and spiritual. It felt so great, that world between consciousness and sleep. That third dimension that I'm believing more and more exists. Just because we can not see things doesn't mean they aren't there. That in itself is what my personal beliefs are based on: Faith. However weird it may seem, I'm wondering more and more about time and space- about this linear time-line we have imposed. It's a man invoked measuring system, but God has no beginning and no end, no depth, he scatters my sin as far as the east is from the west, so what is time to God?

I'm not trying to go all twilight-zone here, or doubting what I know is truth. I just think there is more than we can see. Some larger force always at work. And Rose knew what I needed.

I allowed myself to rest, even just for a moment. I was calmed and reassured. With each stroke of her hands and arms, the in and out and rocking bodies, pressure so deep I almost cried, I knew I was exactly where I was supposed to be in my life. The waves of the ocean pounded beneath my skin, splashing on the tension- eroding the rocky edges. I was aware of separation and pulse and swaying limbs. The way my vertebrae are linked, stacked nicely atop one another, my big toe, my earlobes the place where my legs stop and my butt begins.

It was a dance. It was a mother rocking her child. It was a sailboat being brought to shore by the unseen winds. She guided me. She smoothed out the roughness and made me soft again. She made it safe.

I felt the familial presence of the heroines in my life, the women who lived lives before me. Their blood flows through my veins: Granny, Nana, Memaw and Momma- they rubbed and rocked me. They caressed my skin like they did when I was just days old. Like they did when I learned to walk. Like they did when I graduated kindergarten and played "Ukrainian Bell Carol" during my piano recital and tried on wedding dresses. They were proud of me, just because. And they still are.

Rose finished the hour-long massage by rubbing my head, my hair. With her fingers she applied pressure simultaneously to my forehead and my sternum for about six seconds before walking out the door, "Thank you Stefani." Touching my head and heart.