Laaaa-ser and anesthetic

This, while somewhat surreal, is a true account.

Last night I drove 3h up to Vancouver to see my folks.

Actually, for full disclosure, I first drove 2.75h up to Delta, BC, a satellite city, in order to have a tall middle-aged French-Canadian woman smear gel on my skin and "boil" my hair shafts by zapping me with a laser.

Before beginning my virgin journey down laser hair removal road, the esthetician warned me of rare but alarming possible side effects including blistering, scabbing, and accidental depigmentation of the  skin.  Her postop instructions were to ice the area to bring down swelling, and to be patient while, for 1-2 weeks, the dying hair continues to "evacorate" - some combination I presume of evacuate and evaporate.

My fondest moment came when she asked me to gauge the pain from 1-10.  The sensation of the laser is a lot like being snapped with a rubber band - in ten places at once.  It's no worse than, and actually faster and less painful, than waxing.  "Low," I told her.

She smiled.  "You're a tough lady."

There is a compliment never before leveled at me.  I can think of umpteen contexts immediately where people I know are orders of magnitude tougher: on the soccer pitch, in the weight room, dealing with chronic illness, handling a break-up, after an ankle sprain, while receiving criticism... the list goes on.  Apparently where *I* shine is while lying on a disposable-paper-covered massage table, with a laser aimed at my furriest regions.

It's another fifteen minutes' drive to get to Richmond, a yet-closer-in suburb of Vancouver, at Frieda's B&B, my mother's favourite jumping-off point for Vancouver airport-based travels.

The evening was unexpectedly pleasant apart from the predictable tension while my mother sparred with the server at dinner.

"What can I get for you?"

"Do you have a senior's menu?" We had just spent ten minutes looking at the two laminated pages of the Hog Shack's specialties: ribs, fish and chips, burgers and deep-fried appetizers.  My mother insisted on this venue rather than the recommended Italian Posada's because it was a block closer to the car.  Until we arrived, the median age would not even have achieved 30something unless one left out the plentiful toddler datapoints.

"No, I'm sorry."

"Well," my mother flattened her lips, a gesture I suddenly realized I recognized - I had seen the toddlers here making it after being denied soda or a biscuit, right before they burst into wailing.  "I want something small.  Light."

"Have you seen our salads?" 

"I don't want salad." One of my mother's superpowers is to cast doubt in her fellow conversationalist's mental stability with otherwise simple statements.  It's all in the tone.  It's like being snapped in the face with a rubber band.  It's over before you halfway even realize it's happened.

"We don't have anything else that's small; you could just order something and only eat part of it."

While my father and I ordered, my mother pondered this dilemma, finally settling for a greek salad.

I used to hate going to anything but buffet restaurants, where there are no serving staff to disapprove of.  A major perk of visiting my parents as an adult is that I can usually manage to get in a whole glass of wine before ordering dinner.  It takes the sting out of my mother's rapid-fire commentary.

While we waited for the food to arrive, I was educated on which of my closest friends my mother considers rudest, on a scale of 1 to intolerable.  I ordered another glass of Pinot Gris and mentally raised it to my sister, who, though a year and a half younger, pioneered the prophylactic and palliative use of alcohol at family functions.  She's always been a trail-blazer.