The next morning, I texted Sammy to say that my back felt better than it had in months, maybe even years. Knowing her, I did anticipate at least a polite response, and I awaited it earnestly. The truth is that I was stunned by our connection, and I assumed that I felt more strongly about it than she did. I didn’t know what to make of Sammy’s effect on me…just that I wanted to draw near in life to whatever it was that drew me near to her in our moments together.
I wanted more of that.
Intimacy.
She sent me a generous message in response, thanking me for returning to her with my experience and feedback, and for my specific contributions to our conversation, which she had also enjoyed.
If only I could see her sooner…but two weeks was pushing it. Upon parting, Sammy had advised frequent, longer massages, if I had the financial means. Tempting! But who even gets massages twice a month, right? Certainly not someone relatively young and healthy and living off of her husband’s income…not unless that someone is a spoiled brat.
Yep, definitely pushing it. I was resolved to be content waiting two weeks until my next massage with Sammy.
I went back to my memories. I didn’t actually remember what she looked like. Her voice, though…her laugh…her touch. That spirit. Those words that came from those thoughts. Unforgettable.
To her, I was probably just another client. To me, she was…………..
And then I got an unexpected text from her, a couple days later. The topic of “no ‘bad’ emotions” was one that had come up during my appointment, and Sammy was sending a couple of podcasts she had recently listened to regarding the subject.
Intrigued, I listened as soon as I could, eager to dive into the material, and eager to dialogue with Sammy about it. I don’t remember talking that much about the podcasts but her gesture opened a door of communication between us. A personal one…an outside-of-the-studio one.
It was somehow difficult to know where to go in conversation over text. Our in-person flow was in high resolution; downgrading to SMS, our words seemed to be under pressure. At one point, I made mention of my newfound love of poetry, and Sammy was tickled. Mary Oliver and Rumi were my new acquaintances, but she had known them for years. She requested my favorites; I sent them. She returned the favor, introducing me to new artists. I admitted to being a little bit in over my head and that while I appreciated some of the more obscure poems, I had no place talking about them, because I couldn’t do so intelligently. I playfully suggested that we could have an entire conversation based just on an exchange of poems. To my delight, she was game.
I don’t remember most of the particular poems exchanged. Again, it was a gateway into each other, and that was the real poetry. The essence of one poem elicited an echo from the other in a different form, taking the conversation subtly in another direction, little by little. Sometimes we would respond right away, and sometimes it would be a day or two. I waited with excited anticipation for each new engagement that, at this point, I knew would come because we were the best of playmates. I felt that, and I felt that Sammy felt it.
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One day, while my daughter and I were in the car waiting to pick Anthony up from work, I saw these beautiful flowers outside the window and wanted to capture them. My phone’s camera was having trouble deciding whether to focus on the flowers beyond the glass or on the raindrops that had formed on the window. I knew that Sammy would appreciate the metaphor and the imagery. Her response came in photo form as well, after walking one morning in the woods and coming across a tree which had recently experienced some massive trauma to its previous structure….
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Me: “What a beautiful tree…probably had no idea one day she would be so abruptly exposed. She’s so brave. And probably thinking how lucky to have suffered that misfortune, if it’s what caused you to stumble upon her.”
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And here’s a line from one of the poems Sammy sent, leading right up to the day of the next massage: our second meeting: “I want to unfold. / I don’t want to stay folded anywhere, / because where I am folded, / there I am a lie.” (quoted from Rainer Maria Rilke’s “I Am Much Too Alone in This World, Yet Not Alone” from Rilke’s Book of Hours: Love Poems to God) And a line from my response: “I jumped inside the ring, all of me. Dance, then, and I danced, / till the room blurred like water, like blood, dance, / and I was leaning headlong into the universe.” (quoted from Naomi Shihab Nye’s “Whole Self”)
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We made exchanges until the day was upon us. I drove to Sammy’s studio the same way I had gone before, but this time carrying a deep appreciation of her and of the unfolding of our sacred bond…and a tension that held the mystery of this connection.
I removed everything, including the last little piece of fabric, and I got back on the table. As Sammy’s hands glided over me for the next hour and a half, we barely said a word.
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