Arseology

Mr F came up with a brilliant idea yesterday. He was massaging hemp cream into my dry, cracked feet. Or hooves, as he likes to call them, and I started to tell him about reflexology. Each bit of my foot is connected to a part of my body, I explained. Or an organ in it. That big toe is actually my brain and it needs a bit of help so I can out-wit The Teenager, so rub it extra vigorously, I suggested. He laughed cruelly and asked if I really believed in such drivel. You’re very cynical for one so young, I said, right now you are massaging my left buttock and very nicely too, as he stroked the heel of my left foot. He retorted that he’d much rather be stroking the actual buttock and that’s when he came up with the idea. I wonder if every part of your arse could relate to a part of the body, he mused. I’m sure it does, I murmered, enjoying the new focus. I could develop a new therapy called arseology, he went on. People would pay good money and I could develop an ‘arse-map’ to give it some credibility. I bet it would catch on.

I blame it on him reading ‘Suckers’ by Rose Shapiro which sets out to de-bunk alternative therapies as un-scientific at best and downright dishonest and harmful at worst. Everything from reiki to hopi ear-candling gets a bashing and even the common practice of giving children water to drink to aid learning is shown to be, erm… difficult to swallow. Actually I rather like so-called alternative therapies. There’s something cosy and non-threatening about them, though it does make me giggle when I get told to drink water to ‘flush out my toxins’ after a massage. And I am a bit of a sucker for pseudo-science, though I draw the line at the notice I saw in the sauna at my local health club, which advised bringing in a towel to soak up your body fluids because ‘it’s not fair to expect other people to sit in your melted fat’. But pseudo-science is OK with me if it justifies an enjoyable therapy like, well reflexology actually. Or arseology for that matter.

I suppose alternative therapies become insidious when they become the last hope of anyone with a terminal illness or cash in on unhappiness. I know people in unhappy relationships who spend loads on tarot card readings and ‘personal’ horoscopes, but the tough truth is that if you have to consult a ‘psychic’ to tell you how your boyfriend feels, you might as well admit ‘he’s just not that into you’. The cheap and simple alternative is to just ask him, but that would mean facing up to the answer.

But I digress. If Mr F wants to develop his craft, I am enough of a sucker to let him. Or maybe he is?