Spaaaah Day

Waaaaay back on Mother’s Day, my husband asked me if I’d perhaps received any sort of unusual email.

“Yeah,” I said, “I saw something briefly from Canyon Ranch, but then it disappeared, which was weird. I couldn’t find it again.”

He looked puzzled and asked to see my phone where he found the electronic gift certificate from the famous spa retreat sitting in my trash. Oops.

“I know we’ll screw up Mother’s Day somehow, so I figure we’ll leave it to the professionals to take care of you,” he said, explaining the overly extravagant* gift.

Super nice, but the tricky part was, I had to figure out when to schedule my 8 a.m.-5 p.m. day at the spa since the kids always have something going and I am their dedicated Uber driver/social director. I decided to take the plunge before school started because once that cranked up, I would get shorted on my full day because they’re done with school at 3 p.m. and I was determined that Canyon Ranch staffers were going to have to drag me kicking and screaming from that zenlike environment at exactly 5:01 p.m.

So here’s the thing about me: I like to get my money’s worth and this was a pricey gift. Problem was, while I did get to spend the day there, most of the stuff was extra. I had a $160 credit, but that does not go very far. You get, like, a pedicure. That’s it. Massages were out of the question, but the fitness classes were included so naturally I took three, right off the rip. By noon, I was walking like I had been riding horses for three weeks straight. I lurched around like Frankenstein’s monster. Hard to believe no one escorted me off the premises because I was scaring the real guests.

I also drank my weight in cactus cooler, a free-flowing energy drink that was a delicious mix of orange and grape juices and tea. Let me say, I definitely got my money’s worth out of the spa bathrooms.

But my favorite part was when a woman walked up to me and asked if we were supposed to wear shoes for the Long & Lean Barre class.

“I have no idea,” I told her. “I was wondering the same thing because I’ve never done this before.”

“Oh,” she said, looking a little surprised. “I thought you were the instructor. You look long and lean.”

Honestly, that was really and truly worth the $229 price of admission.

* I’m used to much more modest presents. In fact, the story of my Mother’s Day dinner at Costco’s food court is legendary. That was back when they had Polish sausages so it wasn’t actually that bad of an experience.