Traveler's Journal: Roberto's Massages

(This is a revised version of a previously written essay).

Whatever the journey, travel brings us to one guaranteed destination: to oneself.

Houston’s airport is full of clean lines and stainless steel gleam as I call, page, email for the last few times before I head to Mexico. The last six weeks of deadlines, postponed meetings and missed objectives has settled firmly into my neck causing me pain at every turn of my head. As my plane is called, I pick up my luggage, wince, head to the plank. My cell phone chirps like a trapped bird in my bag, but I let it go until I return in another week.

I arrive in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico with the July rain and a satchel full of ideas and hopes, and a schedule full of contacts and new acquaintances. I had hoped to have had enough time to look it over en route so that I could make every moment count when I landed. As my plane lifted, I settled into my itinerary, my head full of successful meetings with clients. Maybe we will clink our glasses together and make wonderful toasts in Spanish together to celebrate our achievements.

Out my window I see the coastline of Mexico, my neck crunching as I turn and look. I take in the palm trees, I see the ocean and I have a sense of excitement as I near my destination. As I check in I am relieved to know there is a spa. Do I dare?" Can I take the time to enjoy a massage? I thumb through my schedule, squinting, trying to decide what to do, but the ache in my neck can no longer be silenced and I book the appointment for later that same day.
Coral pinks, white sheets and simple archways create a serene and welcoming sense in the spa, though I’m already feeling guilty for the meeting that I’ve left early to be here. Worse I discover that there is no way to check for email in my hotel and room and I am panicked at the thought of how to keep up with the communication back to the states.

Roberto, the massage therapist, greets me warmly but he doesn’t say much. Maybe it’s because I can hardly speak Spanish or maybe he just sees how wired I am. The massage is painful, I yelp out in pain as he carefully, but firmly, massages the knot in my neck. He responds to my pain only with the words, "Breathe and relax."

I breathe shallowly.

He says again, "breathe and relax," as if I had not heard him the first time.
I try to obey but I feel silly. The Great Relaxation God hasn’t always blessed me in his ways and I don’t want to fake it.

Roberto sees me stall but he won’t continue until I breathe so I do because it’s just too much work to fight it. The need to move on is so much a part of who I am that I am impatient with all this breathing. It seems too slow. I just laythere, suspended while Roberto waits me out. "Shouldn’t we be doing something productive?" I almost say aloud.

By the end of the massage my aches are better but Roberto isn’t quite finished with me yet. He asks me to return for a deep tissue massage.

"Why?" I ask.

"Because I think I can help."

I’m not sure at all about this. My schedule is already behind and I’m not sure I’ve got the luxury of time for all this "breathing." Still, I agree to another massage for the next day.

After another day of interminably long business meetings in which I mutilate the Spanish language until I am embarrassed, my enthusiasm for the trip has fallen along with any hopes of a hairdo that will last me this week. The humidity from the ocean has turned my hair into a frizzy mess of rage that is comical. I feel nauseous from the heat and from the food. I start thinking of home and when I can make my way back. Whatever business schedule I had for myself has been derailed in a new world with rhythms that are unfamiliar to me. Phone calls that I am required to make are challenging at best with the language barrier. Meetings are difficult, nearly impossible, to set up in a world where time is a mere suggestion, not a statement of fact like it is in my country. In Mexico, time drifts like a lazy river when I am use to the rapids. I think of my massage with Roberto and realize that again, I have to cut out of a meeting to do so. Will I be able to "relax" better? Doubtfully, I head back to the spa.

My cell phone rings en route and it is my daughter on the other end.

"Mom! The basketball tournament was awesome! We won and I couldn’t miss a shot." She goes on with details about her victory and I am suddenly, unexplicably homesick. I could have been there had I not been sitting in a café waiting for someone who failed to show. I am angry and then suddenly I am crying with a force that surprises me, even frightens me. As I walk into the massage room, I know that Roberto has seen my tears but he says only, "Many people cry when they start to feel better" he says.

By the end of the week, the slower pace of business in Mexico has worn me thin. I begin to imagine what food I will eat once I return home. I yearn for a Sonic Route 44 iced tea, loaded with sugar and lots and lots of ice. I want to eat a Wendy’s hamburger and feel the grease run down my chin. The cobblestone streets of Mexico have ruined two wonderful pairs of shoes and my clothes are all damp, sweaty and full of sand from the ocean breezes. In meetings I continue to gargle the Spanish language and I have doubts as to what I’ve come here to do and if those goals will be met. Indeed, I fear that they will not be.

On my last day in Mexico I have my final massage with Roberto. As I climb the stairs to the spa I can see the ocean on my right. I see the vendors hawking their wares, hear the music of musicians as they stroll the grounds playing for whomever will pay them to do so. Though Mexico confounds me, wears on me, holds me captive from technology and schedules, I am beginning to hear my own breath. In. Out. In. Out.