Wet

Today is hot. Swelteringly hot, with the burning kind of air that makes me think of thick, sweet honey, gooey and good, trickling slowly from my fingers into my mouth. I’ve grown uncomfortable in this heat, but I can do nothing more about it here than I’ve already done. The window to my bedroom is propped open with one of my furry winter boots, and a rickety old electric fan that I picked up at a garage sale for a song blows lukewarm air at my face from where it sits, stuck to the tacky varnish on the glossy mahogany table that serves as my desk.

I’ve been struggling in the heat for a week now, attempting to work on a thirty page paper, the topic of which is Ernest Becker and his theory of terror management. But the heat has warped my mind, and my thoughts are chugging along slowly, like a stream of molasses out of its little cardboard carton.

I saw an advertisement on the wall yesterday, in the psychology building at the university. It offered, in bright colors on glossy paper, a student rate at a hot spring spa an hour and a half west of here. I don’t really have the money, but the heat is getting to me, and the idea of a break is so luscious, after almost twelve months straight of intensive university courses, that I can’t get the idea out of my mind. So as I sit at that little table in my dorm room, of which the quality and size have been improved only slightly now that I am in graduate school, I decide to just go for it. The breeze from the fan as it rustles my many papers is as listless as my energy level.

It’s not like I’m getting a lot done here, at any rate.

I pack a bag and, after a moment’s hesitation, leave my school books as they are, stacked high on the table. With a final look around at the sticky, stifling room—the beige room that represents my entire life at this point—I swing my knapsack over my shoulder and leave, shutting the creaky door firmly behind me.

The very act feels as if a mass of clinging, wet wool has been lifted from my body, and I breathe with greater ease as, after stowing my small bag in the trunk, I slide into the driver’s seat of the ’92 Ford Contour that I recently acquired from my older brother. It groans a little as I turn the key in the ignition, and it reminds me a bit of how I feel right now, as if it takes a massive amount of energy to just get started on my journey.

I need this break, I rationalize to myself. I need it so that I don’t go crazy. Lord knows I’ve been through enough lately, what with the extra courses that I’ve been taking on top of my already full course load, my honors mentoring program, and of course, that nasty little episode with the head of the department, the one in which I ratted him out for feeling me up, which, needless to say, he wasn’t really thrilled about. The memory of it all eases my guilt over the money and time that are about to be spent, and I’m feeling better already as I edge out of the stinking, steaming city and onto the highway, where the wind of speed gusts through my wide open windows. The ground swells as I drive, moving from gently rolling plains to pregnant hills. Soon the granite-colored mountains begin to break out of the land in giant, craggy spears, and I sigh in contentment at the knowledge that, even as I drive, the geothermal soup of the steaming springs is bubbling its way down the mountain in preparation for my healing, two-day soak.

I’m more ready for this weekend than even my own brain can fathom. Now, with a rest in sight, the hunched and crunched muscles of my neck and back—the ones that I’ve thoughtlessly abused for countless hours over the past year, the ones stiff with stress—make their protests known, begging for the mystical healing of the salty springs, the healing of centuries past.

The power, the magic of the ancient place hits me the moment that I arrive and, swinging my pack over my shoulder, where it tangles in my long chestnut hair, I scurry towards the reception desk, eager to get checked into my room and to get my body into the hot pool.

The air of the old place is solemn as I pad my way to my room—solemn but not serious, as if the peace that the old, bubbling well promises demands respect. I find myself quivering with anticipation as I change into my suit, a solid-red two piece, and for once I don’t agonize over the shape of my ass, the softness of my belly, the jiggle of my thighs in the mirror, so eager am I. The room keys are attached to safety pins, and I secure mine to my left hip as I walk, barefoot on the crunchy beige carpeting, my curves hidden by a thick, plush hotel towel. I lose no time ditching the cover-up and easing my body, inch by delicious inch, into the warm water, water made silky with its minerals.

If I had had any doubts about the necessity of this trip, they would have washed away at this moment, with the quiet ripples of wet that circle me, cocooning me in their soothing arms. My every thought drifts, oozing out of my pores and away, away to where I can’t reach, and all that is left is peace.