Another bonus of going down to Chinatown yesterday afternoon for a massage was that I realized that because it’s April, it means it’s mango season. Mangoes will be at their peak in Chinatown, as would fruit like jackfruit. As we walked along Canal, all I could smell was that wafting, sweet and rich scent of jackfruit beckoning. I haven’t picked jackfruit meat out of an actual jackfruit since high school, and I remember quite vividly how sticky and disgusting the process was. I had to have the fruit, though; it was cheap and smelled perfectly ripe. The innards of a jackfruit are like glue, and not polite white Elmer’s glue that washes off simply with soap and water, but the type of glue that persists even after scrubbing an abrasive all over your hands. It’s okay, I thought in my head as I made my half jackfruit purchase. I’m bringing this six-pound baby home. It will be worth it.

Well, I spent about half an hour taking out all the jackfruit meat and scrubbing my hands with salt and soap over and over. Chris washed the dishes and complained on and on about how hard it was to get the jackfruit stickiness off the cutting board and knife. “No more jackfruit in this house!” he exclaimed. “This is pleb work! I’m not doing pleb work!” I insisted I like jackfruit and that it’s tasty. “You can eat it, but no more picking it out in this house!” He yelled back.

Well, he obviously doesn’t like it as much as I do.

Because of the greatness of Chris’s company, we get a sizeable credit every month that his work covers for us to get massages. Since we go to a place we found in Chinatown that is only $36 an hour, his credit covers both of us plus an over 50 percent tip we give to the masseuses. I was never that excited about massages, but Chris loves them and looks forward to them each month, and of course, he drags me with him. And I know I sound like a brat when I say this, but most of the time I don’t really want to go. I’m just lazy on Sundays and want to stay in our neighborhood.

Well this time, I actually really wanted a massage, and I’d been really wanting one since the wedding weekend. When we went in today, my regular masseuse Lucy commented to me in Chinese that every time I come, my muscles are usually quite knotted and I seem like I’m under stress, but this time, they were especially knotted. “Every time you come, your muscles are more and more tired, but this time, they are the most tired!” she exclaimed while chuckling. I didn’t want to launch into a whole broken Chinese conversation about how I had just pulled off planning three days worth of wedding events, so I just laughed and said that I was really exhausted and that her work felt really comforting.

And then tonight, as I am writing this, I realize that my muscles are sore from all her work. She really did get all the knots out, but now I am in slight pain.

I have a lot of flaws, but one of the flaws that bothers me and probably anyone who will ever live with me is that I always feel like I need to be doing something. I know I get this from my mother, and I know she recognizes it, too, when she sees me. One thing that my friend and former roommate once pointed out to me was that just because I may be efficient doesn’t necessarily mean that I am having fun.

One day years ago when we were living together, I spent a whole Sunday out running many errands and then came home to reorganize and clean. When she came home later that night, she asked me, “How was your day?”, and I responded, “It was good. I got a lot of things done.” She said back to me, “Did you have fun?” And I replied, “Yeah, I was really efficient.” She then said, “Yvonne, that wasn’t what I asked you. I asked you if you had fun, not if you were efficient.”

I feel like I barely did anything today, and it actually felt good. Yeah, I did clean the bathtub last night, and I did sweep the floors and do the week’s grocery shopping, but today, I got the closest to doing nothing as I probably ever will. This weekend is the first weekend since the wedding that we have no plans, no visitors, and nothing on the schedule. And it feels so relaxing, which I rarely feel. This is a good feeling.