The Deal Breaker

I see a lot of naked bodies every day. I’m pretty tolerant of bodily functions of all kinds, so few things make me shudder. However, there is one that always sends tremors down my spine, and that is my biggest and grossest pet peeve: to come upon clammy feet and hands. I’m sorry for any of you that suffer from the inability to control or absorb the massive amounts of sweat flowing from your icy, soggy hands and feet (hereafter referred to as Clammy Hand and Foot Syndrome or "CHAFS"). I don’t hate you, I just hate how it feels. The experience of sliding around in someone else’s sweat is something I won’t go into detail about, even though I'm tempted to. While massaging my latest CHAFS inflicted client today, I thought seriously about going into explicit detail about how much I suffer.

Now it could’ve been fate, her über-Italian last name, or my keen ability to find irony, but for some reason as I began massaging this woman's feet, my thoughts wandered to a blog I recently read. This post about Italian-American culture made me think: “Hey, Italian-Americans sound pretty cool. I like to eat, I love my family, I’m not against chasing my husband around with a broom (was that one of the qualities?), and I don’t actually have to be in the mafia and get people whacked?! What a deal!”

Then sweaty feet suddenly brought me back to reality. "Eww," I thought, "I better dry girlfriend's feet off with this sheet for the third time. I wonder if she knows..."

“Sorry!” she suddenly interrupted, “I’m Italian, so when I’m hot my feet get sweaty.”

Hey, hold it there for one second, signora! Did you just say that sweaty feet are the side effect of a totally sweet Italian-American lifestyle? If so man, this deal is OFF. There’s no way I’m getting slammed with CHAFS.