Four nights ago …

… I was wearing a velvety robe, snuggled under a fleecy blanket on a leather chair in a darkened room with spa music being piped in as I stared into a crackling fire.

(And let’s not talk about the vivid fantasies one has in that kind of environment. Oh, no. Perhaps the only bad thing about traveling alone is that there is NOWHERE to release all those little scenarios. *sigh*)

In that room (which I had all to myself, thankfully), I was also hooked up to an oxygen machine, if you can believe it, and the O2 was orange-scented. I’d just had a facial and massage and was deliriously, stupidly happy and pampered. My skin was clear from the mountain air and from the expensive treatment I’d just had (and charged to someone else. Hah), and Life was Good.

I totally get why the wealthy are oftentimes, well, assholes when they’re not treated like royalty. As I’ve never been treated like a VIP before, I had no point of comparison. But when you’ve got people falling at your feet and delivering little snacks to your door and basically kissing your ass because they think you have money, well, it’s not the most horrible feeling in the world. 😉 And then when you return to reality, you wonder why nobody else thinks you’re as special as the people who are paid to.

But alas, you do realize that of course you should be worshipped when there’s money involved, and you know they’d be indifferent toward you otherwise and that they’re really worth their tips if they can truly allow you to believe that you’re the most important person in the world for that brief time that you have with your instant, minor celebrity status.

What that means to me is that I’ve got to work on pampering myself. So I bought the expensive body cream that they used on me and gave myself a lovely foot bath tonight and slathered it on. Just the scent takes me back to that heated massage bed, where nothing mattered save for the fact that I was happy.

I’ve decided that, when money becomes a little less tight, I want to pick up a paraffin wax machine and maybe even some sort of microdermabrasion set. And that’s just to start — I just want to give myself little treats from time to time that remind me that I’m special when no one else is around to assure me of it, because I do forget.

The thing is, doing nice things for yourself and investing in good beauty products (i.e., not the drugstore variety) not only does wonders for your skin, but it also seeps through to a much deeper level. It makes you radiant inside as well as out. And, as I’ve found, no matter how much work you do on yourself from the outside in, it’s twice as effective (and takes half the effort) when you take care of yourself the opposite way.

This year is off to an amazing start for me. And I’m not slowing the roll anytime soon — I’m not letting myself fall to the bottom of the priority list like I always do. Because it’s harder to regenerate your spirit when you’re running on empty. So we take life’s moments, big and small, and not let them become a distant memory before we remember that *we* need attention more than anything or anyone else.

It’s funny — after my spa treatment, I went outside and knew I had a little smile playing around my face. And a guy stopped dead in his tracks to watch me. He even turned around. I laughed — it’s been awhile since I’ve had that happen. I looked back and smiled and kept on going, and it was then that I realized that I’ve worked very hard to make people think I’m having fun. But instead of trying to fool follks into believing it, I’m just going to keep having a blast.

It’ll pay to make life more enjoyable — it just means I’ll be around longer to experience even better moments. I’m not content to only have them in memories. …

2 Responses to Four nights ago …

  1. Erica :

    See what that did for your mental health? This is how I justify things that I can’t afford. Not so much *stuff* I can’t afford, but *experiences* I can’t afford.

  2. nic :

    Have you heard the expression “Fake it ’til you make it”? Now you’re making it, eh?

    And those paraffin things are great.