A Glimpse Down the Rabbit Hole

I got my mother's day present from my older son today: a "How to Massage Your Mother" class. A massage therapist friend of ours ran it, but I did not know about it until we were on our way there.

The friend and her son demonstrated the techniques first, then the kids followed suit on their own mothers. My seven year old son rubbed my feet, my shoulders and my back. He was very serious about his technique and used the most delicate of touches.

When we got home he was complaining of "freezing" and turned out to have a temperature of 101. For some reason that made his efforts all the more poignant. He wasn't feeling all that great himself, but he gave his all to working on me. I was truly touched.

Of course on realizing he was ill, I immediatley reverted to the giver role and got him on a lots-o-fluids gig and negotiated an earlier bedtime. The book we started reading happened to be Lewis Carroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland," a rather apt description of what it felt like to be having my feet squeezed and kneaded tenderly by my own child.