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Jewish World Review Sept. 27, 2006 / 5 Tishrei, 5767
Spa me the kids
By Celia Rivenbark
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C'mon, you're kidding right? What does a 10-year old need a massage for? Tough afternoon of kickball on the playground got your neck muscles a little tense? Suffering from shoppers' shoulder after hauling around those bags full of $50 T-shirts from Aberzombie? Puleez. Maybe I'm just jealous. I was 40 years old before I had my first manicure and it just seems a tad unfair for a 10-year-old to be working in a mani-pedi between hopscotch and oboe lessons. While a facial would've been a good idea for those of us who grew up as teenagers in the pre-Accutane era, it's hard to figure out why a 10-year old (or, younger, in some cases) really needs one. At that age, isn't it still OK for the banana-berry facial to be less from a $50 treatment administered by someone named Ramone and more from the yummy remnants of a Baskin-Robbins smoothie? (munch, munch) To paraphrase Ricky Ricardo, The world? She's a-gone nuts. It's not just little girls, of course. There's also something called the "mini-metrosexual phenomenon." This accounts for the astounding success of pre-teen boys' body sprays such as Tag and Axe. I guess we've come a long way from the date-night dousing of Brut that I remember gagging on in high school. Still, there's something not quite right about the image of a 10-year-old boy fretting about the proper brand of hair product when he should be analyzing box scores or putting his sister's bra in the freezer. I mean what kind of freaks are we raising these days, anyway? (munch, munch) Of course it's fun to dress up, experiment with make up and play big-girl hair. I mean you'd have to be Cruella d'Ville mean not to allow that once in a while. But it's the notion of regular spa appointments for little girls that sits with me like week-old bean dip. I'm not ready for my 9-year-old to breathlessly inform me that Rafiki has had a cancellation by another "client" whose "like, grandmother or something died" so now she can get her hot-stone massage and sugared peach-pulp pedicure after all. I think the whole thing started innocently when a few stressed-out moms craved bonding time with their daughters. But it got out of hand and now we have an enormous industry catering to 7-year-old's who tweeze. To them I say, go climb a tree or something. Bark is great for exfoliation.
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When I read in "USA Today" that 10-year-old girls are going to the spa in droves for massages and facials, I had to lower my 20-foot long neck, release the branches of the tree that I had been munching on and laugh a throaty dinosaur laugh.