Wax on Wax off on Two

My wife says to me: "Kipp when was the last time you got a hair cut?"

Me: "About three weeks ago.  Why?

Wife: "Turn around let me see your neck."

My wife had got a new wax product from her sister.  This new wax product was being billed as nearly pain free.  By reducing the amount of wax with an amazing new space aged polymer it reduces the pain factor considerably.  Per the instructions on the tub container, to get the best performance and most pain free experience the "targeted area" should have a few weeks worth of hair growth.  Seeing the back of my neck and now with the knowledge it has three week hair growth on it, my wife's plan was set in motion. 

Wife: "Have you ever used wax?"
Me: "Seriously, you just asked me that...no." 
Wife: "OK good then we will try it on your neck first.  Just a little bit to see how good it works.  If it works like it should we can do your entire neck."

There was no further discussion.  She heads for the kitchen to warm the wax.  I am left standing in front of the bathroom mirror rubbing my neck thinking my neck could use a trim.  It will be smooth as a baby bottom in a few minutes.    

She returns from the kitchen with the warm wax.  She gets about a tablespoon worth of wax.  As she is about to apply it to my neck, she decides to go down to a teaspoon.  With the Popsicle stick applicator she applies the wax to the right side of my neck.  The warm wax was smoothed out, best I could feel it was about the size of a piece of Laffy Taffy candy.  (About an inch rectangle swath of wax over the three week old neck hair) 


The instructions read aloud by my lovely wife:
"Let the wax set for about 30 seconds then apply a pull strip.  Next taking a firm grip on the pull strip, jerk quickly." 


I am about a head taller than my wife and I out weigh her by about a person.  The logistics of this next step required some positioning for leverage.  I leaned over the sink with my elbows on the counter.  My head hanging over the sink.  This placed the "target area" in a great position for my wife to pull the strip and jerk quickly.  My wife placed her left hand on my back and her feet planted firmly on the floor.  I felt a little pressure on my back when she grabbed the pull tab with her right hand.  


Me: "Ouch!" 
I stand up.
Wife: "WHAT!"
Me: "You are supposed to rip it."
Wife: "I just grabbed the pull strip.  I did not rip it yet."
Me: "Well you already pulled a few hairs out."
Wife: "I was just getting a grip."
Me: "Well grab and rip, lets go."
I lean back over the sink.


She grabbed the pull strip again and pushing down on my back and this time on my neck, asked if I was ready.  


Me:"Should I take a deep breath?  Should I hold my breath?  If you will just pull when I am not expecting it.  Maybe it will catch me off guard that way...(she tugged)

Me:..."HAVE MEEERCY!!  O MY MMMMMMMMM!!"
In an instant my legs gave way, my right knee hit the floor first.  My vision was immediately flooded with black fly like creatures zipping across in front of the dim light behind them.  My body temperature increased to about a thousand degrees.  Sweat from areas that normally do not sweat, were wet.  I lost hearing.  My neck was on fire.  Tears welled up in my right eye.  My left eye seemed to have popped straight out of its socket.  My hands had gotten stuck under the faucet from where I was leaning on the counter.  If not for them being lodged, I would have been on the floor in the fetal position sucking my thumb.


Wife:  "Auh waa o cha?"
Me: "AAAAA!  HAHA! AHHHHHH!"
Wife: "Auh waah o cha?"
Me: "OW OW OWWWW!"
My hearing returned and I was finally able to understand her. 
Wife: "Are you OK?"
Me: "Am I OK?  Aww it's not so bad, considering you just RIPPED SKIN, MUSCLE AND TENDONS RIGHT OFF MY BODY!"


My wife, I guess, seeing that I was able to breath again and speak coherent words starts laughing uncontrollably.  Not just girly giggling, I am talking doubled over, cross legged so she would not pee herself, laughing.  When she regained her composure she says the worst words she has ever spoken to me in the umpteen years we have been together, these words still haunt me...

Wife: "Kipp not all the wax came off.  There is still about two thirds still attached to your neck."
She went back to her cross legged position.

Me: *!
*There are times when certain adult language is blurted out without foreknowledge of the adult that speaks it.  This was one such occurrence.  
Me: "This has to come off.  You have to do it.  I can't reach it nor do I think I could consciously do something so painful to myself.  It would be like asking me to saw off my arm starting from under my armpit using a hand held limb saw."

Wife: "Are you ready?"
Me: "YES! While my adrenaline is still flowing!  For God's sake woman, use BOTH hands!  Put your foot on my back and use your legs!"
Wife: "I do not want to hurt you."
Me: "Did you really just say that?"

With her new found inspiration from the look she was just given, she immediately stepped on my back, grabbed the pull strip with both hands, grunted with a primal scream of a cave woman killing a saber tooth tiger and ripped the wax from my neck.  She stood with the wax held high over her head with her foot still in my back as if I was the dead carcass.  I barely heard her over my own screams.

Wife:"Lie still while I go get some paper towels from the kitchen."
Me: "Why?"
Wife: "You are bleeding.  Don't move.  I don't want to have clean up the floor."


As I lie there bleeding, wet with sweat, neck on fire, black flies filling my vision, a bruised kidney or at least a broken rib, repenting for the adult language, I thought...How can they handle this but still be so scared of spiders and roaches?


About three months after the waxing "incident", the scab had healed.  The bald spot left took another couple of weeks for the neck hair to grow back.  It showed up in the purest silvery gray hair you have ever seen.  It is the only patch of gray hair I have on my entire body.  I can only imagine it is my body commemorating the spot of absolute trauma it sustained that day.