Sunday, February 25, 2007

Hippie Blood Runs Thick

I was raised by hippies. Looking back on my childhood, I can sometimes point to this relation when it comes to my resilience to the rub & tug "ick" factor. I'm not saying I am a product of hippies - in fact, my siblings took the opposite route by being virginal, Republican Christians. I also opposed their tastes by being a little goth/punk, but realized the hippie was in my soul.

Although I was a child of the 80s, my memories are of my mother housecleaning in the nude, yoga parties, Dead concerts, our VW van with curtains, R. Crumb comics, growing weed in the backyard, crystal healing, organic snacks... What helped formulate my becoming a woman were the new age tantra/sex/massage books my mother seemed to have a library of. I would secretly study the illustrations of hairy bohemians in blissfully complicated positions - their expressions radiating a glow from their third eye. For me, sex seemed like an impossibly complicated mating dance used for the goal of world peace and magical powers. In high school I discovered what sex really was: clumsy, messy, and mostly hilarious.

When I became a bodyrub girl, I pulled out a lot of my counterculture upbringing to create an air of mysticism. I use tantra and yoga moves along with a hypnotising tone of voice, and the clients are mesmerised by it. Sometimes I feel like a fraud since I'm actually an atheist who likes it rough, but maybe it's good I'm keeping the hope of Hippie Utopia alive.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Interesting post. It seems like the best thing to do is to strike a balance between everything. Obviously, rough wouldn't work in your field and too business-like is obviously a turn-off, but I've been in situations where the new age factor was turned way too high and I've thought, you know, I'm not here for spiritual enlightment.

Colleen said...

Hey! I have a VW bus with curtains! That's about where our upbringings' similarities end, although I totally have Republicaned-out fam members.

Colleen said...

I just realized that could read wrong. I have family members who are robo-Republican. I'm not out-Republicaning anyone, for sure.

Miss NFS said...

Cokane - strange how we resist our parents, but replicate them as well! ps: I totally got what you meant ;-D