During President’s Weekend I decided to take my daughter, Maya, to Calistoga for a spa decompression treat–a Girls Getaway–that actually was a promotion at the Solage Spa and Resort in Calistoga. Part of the package included a mudslide and complimentary cocktails the day of arrival.
After a beautiful drive over the Golden Gate Bridge and through the lower part of wine country, we were greeted at the beautiful Solage with gracious hospitality and the “Mud Slide” treatment. What fun! We were ushered into a stone slab shower and spa bathhouse designed exclusively for administering a clay concoction infused with fragrances including mint, lemongrass, and lavender, which we slathered on each other. The clay/mud concoction hardened and cracked while we lay on the slate slabs on warm towels with cucumber slices over our eyes. What’s not to like? After showering, we went outside for another rinse off before going into a bathtub room with humongous tubs that made me slide around (due to their length) so I thought I might drown. Maya clued me in as to how to stay above water by arching my back and pointing my toes. Our giggles and laughter prompted the Solage spa assistant to keep knocking on the door to see if we were alright.
Still another step in the process of the “Mud Slide” was walking in our fluffy robes (au naturel, of course) to the women’s secluded outdoor pool, warmed to the perfect temperature. There were probably about ten other young women (20’s and 30’s) in the pool as we lowered ourselves down into the soothing, steaming, and aromatic water. As each woman rose from the water, one by one, to move on to the sauna for the final stage of the “mud slide”, I couldn’t help but notice the array of “pubic haircuts” displayed. I tried not to stare or gape–but didn’t do a very good job of it. I couldn’t help myself–there was the “Brazil” (no hair) I had read about, other half-and-half trims which were just lower than the crease below the navel, or zigzagged, and what I call the “double moustache”, just a brief hairline on each side of the “two-lips”. How was I supposed to know such a variety existed among young women? And, who would do that to herself? Wouldn’t it be excruciatingly painful? This is another experience like “laminated list”–women my age just have no clue.
So, that is my “mud slide” experience–a slide into another zone I thought I knew only too well. My awareness of a “girls getaway” experience was just that: a “getaway” from even what I assumed was every “girl’s” anatomy.