Thoughts on Brazil

If you’re male, and/or related to me and/or are uncomfortable about hearing about “female subjects” (in this case, my vagina – sorry, Dad and Joe) I suggest that you just commit this one fact to memory: Any time you see an image of fro-yo at the beginning of one of my blog posts you can feel relatively certain that “female subjects” will follow it. And hey – look at that. Here’s some fro-yo! Now, if you’re in that special group of people who aren’t interested in hearing about the Southlands – GTFO. Everyone else, proceed.

Is it safe now?

Good.

If we’re being honest, and I’m not sure how much MORE honest I can be than talking about my vagina on the Internet, my vagina has been feeling rather neglected lately. This is not a reference to the amount of visitors it receives (that’s none lately, if you’re keeping score and if you are you should probably GTFO too cause that would be really creepy) but actually my way of saying I’ve been really damn annoyed because I bought a Living Social coupon for 2 Brazilian waxes and made my appointment only to have them cancel on me the day before. And yes, I do know I’m technically using the word vagina wrong and if you can’t get around that feel free to GTFO as well. I’m not usually this hostile, am I? Anyway.

If you’ve never been waxed “down there” before, you should know you have to let the hair grow in to a certain length before they can actually wax it. Think about it – the wax needs something to grab onto. Anyway, I suffered through the hair growth and was all set for my “trip to Brazil” when I got the call. Now get this – not only were they canceling on me, it was because they had to close the shop to retrain their staff. Holy gosh, there’s not much that instills confidence in a woman like saying you have to retrain everyone.

Still, I had paid for my coupon and I let them reschedule me for this past Saturday. Now I’m not new to the Brazilian waxing game – if you’ve been with me a while you know my deal with hair down there (namely that I can’t handle it) and after a series of unfortunate events I did what you all were probably thinking all along that I should do and sought professional help. Only some of you were probably thinking and still are that I should be searching for an MD who might be able to prescribe me some sort of “just be like a normal person” medication and straighten me out. I however went after help in the form of an esthetician and after my first brazilian have been a total convert. Only that shit is expensive and I have a crippling iced coffee and Slurpee addiction to support (this is not a joke) so I normally just shave my homegirl and call it a day. Then there was this LivingSocial deal and it was actually within a reasonable distance from my house and didn’t require any sort of bizarre parking tango AND the place had good reviews online. Not perfect ones that might have raised a red flag as being too perfect, but not anything more horrible than the usual “take it with a grain of salt” type of comment you so often see online. So I bought it and was all excited and then this.

Well, time passed and I forgot my concerns until I was driving to the actual appointment. And then I started trying to calm myself down with the usual, “how bad could it be?” type of thoughts. Only this is my vagina we’re talking about and there is hot wax involved and suddenly my what ifs were not in the form of “what if they miss a spot” and more along the lines of “what if I get third degree burns ON MY VAGINA?”

Somehow I talked myself down and I felt calm when I went inside the salon and even calmer when I got into the treatment room. It was a nice place and clearly clean and everyone seemed totally competent. The wax began and I was lying there thinking I’d been silly to worry because this woman clearly knew what she was doing when my thoughts took another turn. After every strip of wax this woman peeled off of me, she apologized. Now let’s just get this straight – I’m lying there, paying her to literally rip my pubic hair out, roots and all, and she’s apologizing to me? I’m sorry, no, I did not come here to snuggle. I knew full well what I was up against and I still signed on. And to make this better, her work did not hurt as bad as others I’ve had in the past.

Granted, I don’t know exactly what I would expect someone to say. Is it better that she ignore my pain completely? Talk about the weather? Perhaps engage in a lively debate over wearing white past Labor Day? “Suitable Conversation for Brazilian Waxes” was not an entry in the Future Stepford Wives of America handbook.

At any rate, we finished up and she took the time to pluck the stray hairs she missed during the wax process. I was really happy until I realized there were actually quite a few hairs she missed – some I’m still finding – and there was no way I’d be lying there while she got them all. But I had other plans and I was not going to, I can’t resist, split hairs over the whole thing. I escaped, preferring my lack of burns over a more thorough wax job.

Which brings me to my next dilemma: I have one wax remaining with this salon on my living social deal. At this point it’s a sunk cost – that money is just gone – but I could save myself the tip money to be used for future pumpkin mochas and/or cherry&coke Slurpees by canceling my next appointment and just not going back. But there’s part of me that wonders if maybe it would be better next time (why? why do I even think that?) and there’s the irrational part of me that’s like “you spent that money you should use it!” even though I’ll probably have to go home and clean up the work like I did this time. There is an option to call the salon and ask if I can see a different waxer which is a worthwhile pursuit if it would mean getting a better experience but I was under the impression when I scheduled my follow-up that there was only one woman who did the waxing so this may be a moot point.

But beyond this coupon, I’m trying to figure out how I proceed. My friends swear by a salon in Georgetown that not only does amazing work but they are speedy and the price is excellent. Only I live outside the Beltway and if you’re not from the Northern Virginia/DC area let me spell this out for you: telling someone who lives in my area that they should go anywhere in DC for what amounts to a 20 minute procedure is the equivalent of telling you to caulk a wagon and float to China so you can order carryout. Add Georgetown as your final destination and it’s like your entire wagon party got Cholera and you had to shoot your last ox. Seriously, if you LIVE in DC it’s hard to get to Georgetown so you can just forget getting there from anywhere else. I have a hard enough time talking myself into going places in Arlington because of the aforementioned bizarre parking tango issue and that’s not even difficult to get to from where I live. And I’ll stop there before I decide to just replace this whole paragraph with a #whitegirlproblems hashtag.

So what say you, friends? Do I go back for wax #2 so I can quiet that part of me that irrationally wants to get my money’s worth (though the service is not under any circumstances worth what I paid)? Do you NoVA folks have any recommendations for waxing places that don’t require me to take the metro, pay to park, or spend a year of my life looking for street parking?

And a more general follow up question – how do you feel about posts like this? Are you in favor of periodic discussion of “female subjects”? Or are you of the opinion that maybe I should stick to safe things like crafts and Pinterest and just not talk about “down there”?

(feel free to be honest here, I promise my hostility has waned and I will not to say GTFO to anyone (that is anyone I don’t know in real life) (unless you’re telling me to quit whining and go to Georgetown))

Tagged as: brazilian wax, lady bits, vagina