There I was, naked from the waist down, to wax my butt, clutching my knees and trying to act like this was not the most vulnerable position possible.
“I’m sorry I’m late,” my very proper southern friend Charlotte announced as she breezed on to the pool party I was giving at our home in Singapore. “I was having trouble plucking a nasty hair from my chin.”
Wait. What?
Did Charlotte just acknowledge to a patio full of strangers that she had been removing unwanted hair? Was that allowed?
I thought pulling out the tiny saplings that had recently begun sprouting on my 41-year old face was a secret. Now Charlotte had brought the unmentionable out into the open. God bless her southern heart.
Recently, I had seen hair everywhere. One day I was applying lipstick in my rearview mirror and there in the bright sunlight was a tiny mustache. On me. I hid my face in shame and hightailed it to my salon, where my waxing lady whisked it away with one strip. While I was there, I asked for my usual bikini wax.
“Do you want to try a Brazilian?” she inquired as she began spreading the warm wax on my inner thigh.
“Oh no thanks, that just seems unnatural. I mean, I’m a grown woman, I should have pubic hair,” I replied, failing to mention that the thought of hot wax on my lips terrified me.
“But it’s so humid here in Singapore; a Brazilian will make you feel fresh and cool.”
“No thanks, just the bikini wax.”
Over the coming months, my waxing lady, determined to convert me, stealthily inched further and further down with each succeeding wax, ever closer to my vagina, but I always stopped her hand when she got too close. It was like batting a boy away in high school.
In the 12 years since, my little battle against unwanted hair has become an all-out war.
My waxing appointments now hover around $150 a pop and are more time-consuming. My bikini line. My thighs. My eyebrows. My upper lip. And now, my chin. Because those chin hairs are like Kamikaze pilots refusing to surrender, I keep a pair of tweezers next to my bed to attack them while I binge-watch Sex and the City before going to sleep.
Not to be outdone by her counterpart in Singapore, my waxing lady here in the US also preaches the gospel of the Brazilian, but I’ve held fast. Then one day a few months ago in the shower, as I was washing between my legs, I was caught up short by a new and troubling development: a veritable bush had sprouted in my ass.
As I lathered the soap, running my hand back and forth I wondered, when did my ass become so hairy?
I was mortified. This would not do. It was one thing to have pubic hair, but butt hair? That was for old men. I’m not judging anyone who prefers to go au natural, but for me? No. Just no.
At my next waxing appointment, as I lay on the table with my legs splayed open, I asked in the most nonchalant voice I could feign, “So, do women ever get their bottoms waxed?”
“You mean your asshole?” Eve, replied as she ripped away a strip of hair. “Sure, all the time. Do you want to do that today?”
“Um, well, I was thinking about it.”
“Does this mean you want a Brazilian?”
“No, not exactly, I still want hair, just not in my ass.”
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When she had finished with my usual not-quite-Brazilian bikini wax, Eve told me to take off my underwear. I expected her to tell me to turn over onto my stomach, but instead, to my horror, she told me to pull my knees to my chest.
There I was, naked from the waist down, clutching my knees and trying to act like this was not the most vulnerable position possible for a woman not having sex.
“Are you ready?” Eve asked as she twirled the hot wax on her wooden stick.
“No, but do it anyway.”
I closed my eyes tight and tried to relax. The warm wax felt strangely soothing on my skin. The pain that ensued when she smoothed the paper down and ripped the hairs away from my anus? Not so much.
“Eve, how can you do this? Isn’t it so gross for you?” I asked to take my mind off the pain.
“I do it because it makes people happy,” Eve replied as she continued to strip my derrière bare.
Within a few minutes, it was all over. It hurt like hell, but Eve told me the first time is the worst, and it would be easier from then on out. She spread some cream on me, gave me some samples to use at home, and sent me on my merry way.
That night in the shower I couldn’t wait to feel the new me.
After lathering up, I slid my hand between my butt cheeks and, low and behold, they were soft and smooth as the day I was born. It was a revelation! I was so enamored with my newly hairless tush that I nearly forgot to wash the rest of my body.
I’m still reveling in my new bald bottom. And while I realize that a lot of women go hairless to please a partner (and nothing wrong with that), I take extra delight in the fact that I did this for me and me alone. If a future lover finds it a turn-on, good for him; if not, tough luck pal.
I’m left wondering what took me so long. It’s not as if I was hairless one day and Grizzly Adams the next. I should have done this years ago. In fact, I’m so delighted with my smooth ass that I’m now considering a Brazilian.
My waxing lady in Singapore would be so proud.
