A warm pair of soft hands wiped the hair from my forehead. The Pacific Ocean roared from a tiny black boombox, its groan and tumble shifting my reality from winter wind to the promise of summer. I knew her shift of tide and sand, her captured echo of gull, of dried kelp rustling against barnacled moor. It’s been almost five years since I lived on her edge, since I called the waters home.

The hands continued to caress my face, continued to gently rub potions scented with lavender, with rosemary, into opening pores. Careful hands placed cool, refreshing slices on my closed eyes and the years faded, diluted by the touch of a woman whose life echoed the ebb and flow of my almost-forgotten sea.

Valerie Hayden, aesthetician at Advanced Skin, Hair & Body Salon, knows what it’s like to court age, to feel the beauty of one’s own soul without caving to media’s unhealthy addictions. She sat on the edge of a padded iron chair at Traveler’s Café, her supple skin unlined, free of makeup.

“I always felt very uncomfortable with my body and I didn’t like it. I was always wishing I had a different body. I just had a really poor body image.” Valerie began to relax as she spoke. She rested her elbows on the thick wooden table, taking sips from a chilled chai latté. “It wasn’t until I was 40 that I decided it was time to embrace my body – and at every birthday, I would have some kind of body treatment. To bring in the new year, and to appreciate my body as it was changing and growing older, and to make up for all that self-hatred.”

As Valerie reminisced, I, too, thought of the body I once tried to capture through diet, through exercise, through wish, curse, and prayer. A young woman sat at a table near us, a slim compact mirror in one hand, desert rose gloss in another, unknowingly translating our conversation into theatre. She applied a thick shiny coat to puckered lips. She started at her reflection with an expression of dissatisfaction.

“When I would meet someone who had this amazing self image,” Valerie continued, “I wondered how they escaped the cultural images of what a body should look like. I think there’s a lot of pressure to have a certain kind of body, especially in our culture. My self-appreciation came late in my life. At least it came.”

Valerie knew at an early age that she wanted to live a life in service to others. Her family moved from neighborhood to neighborhood, giving her a familiarity with and deep love for different cultures, from Latin to Native American. By watching her great grandmother struggle, she realized that seniors faced terrible injustices.

“I went into social services, wanting to care for people, the elder community. And that’s what I did for some years. During my adult life I moved around, and lived in Oregon, Altanta, finally San Francisco.”

Valerie paused. She took a deep breath, then a long sip of chai.

“I moved to San Francisco, I moved there because I wanted to make some money and go traveling. Unfortunately, I was in a severe motorcycle accident. I smashed my head open. I had surgery. I couldn’t move for five years. I went to a special school to learn how to do the basic things all over again. I still have limitations. I worked very hard to recover, and then went to beauty school to become an aesthetician. I chose it because I could no longer do social work. It was an opportunity to help people appreciate their bodies, appreciate their skin, to kind of help people relax in a very stressful environment. San Francisco is a very big city.”

As Valerie told her story, I tried to find evidence of the accident, tried to hear something in her level voice, to see something in the graceful tilt of her body that would suggest limitation, but I could not. She sat, a vibrant, intelligent soul, sharing painful experience the way women know how to do – with candor and awareness.

“I worked at a skin care clinic with two other aestheticians,” Valerie explained. “It was an opportunity to work on my memory and listening skills. Even though I couldn’t remember a single thing I read, I still read books. Even though it took me the longest time to write letters, I still wrote letters. And I went to graduate school to get my masters in social work at the same time. I felt so grateful that I was learning new things and not relearning old things anymore. I felt so appreciative whereas other students were focusing on policies and complaining all the time. I just felt so grateful I was there.”

Studying community development and organizing made Valerie realize that the greatest changes in a community happen when people work together. After moving to Las Vegas, she started a women’s book club and a women’s vegetarian supper club, relatively new groups whose membership includes an intergenerational mix of perceptive women interested in discussion and trying new things. She hopes to continue creating change and is gathering a coalition of people interested in helping build a community center for entertainment and the arts.

“I love networking. I love creating community. I’ve always been community focused, and that became even more apparent when I went back to graduate school. I have had a wonderful opportunity when Laurie Hays opened the salon. It’s a great way to make community,” Valerie noted. “When I moved to Las  Vegas I tried to find my niche. I got very involved with the Obama campaign. I really felt like I was helping create change.”

Valerie grinned as she described her work at Advanced Skin, Hair & Body Salon, where she does a wide array of treatments including customized facials, peels, oxygen facials, dermabrasion, waxing, and lash and brow tints.

“When people come into our space, it’s a tranquil place where they can leave the outside behind. It’s an hour that’s just for you. It’s great for your soul, your skin. It’s regenerative. It gives you the opportunity to say ‘I’m important’ as a woman. As women we are such caregivers, however we don’t give ourselves self-care. I feel like I’m enhancing and improving people’s lives. Giving them back their power, and respecting and honoring them for who they are.”

Valerie’s words stayed with me after she left the coffee shop. I recalled her loving care during my facial, recalled the way my face, my body, my mind felt two decades younger when she was done. A woman building community, handing other women a generous platter of self-love along with her vegetarian potluck. We’re lucky to have her here.

You can reach Valerie at Advanced Skin, Hair & Body, 600 Railroad, Las Vegas, at (505) 426-8224.