37. See the Post Office tree in Mossel Bay.

38. Get a pedicure. I wasn’t sure that getting a pedicure was a good idea until Lisa, the total stranger who had just trimmed my toenails for me, began filing my heels. I suppose that, had I ever stopped to really consider my feet – until that instant I had not – I would have surmised that there was dead skin on them. I wouldn’t have guessed how much. Now I know where they get the snow for snow globes from.

But a pedicure is more than just the eradication of callus. It’s about shedding all kinds of things. I was sweating when I booked my first appointment at a spa called Nourish Your Sole in Cobourg, Ontario. A woman named Cheryl assured me that men get pedicures all the time. They even had a special one for men that involved beer. Not drinking beer, though. Soaking your feet in it.

That’s how my pedicure started. I soaked my feet in a big metal tub filled with warm water, bubbles, and beer. My pedicure ended with my feet looking and feeling like the best parts of my body. In-between, Lisa did so much good and enthusiastic work, I’d wager I lost a measurable amount of weight.

I had also been stripped of a host of my former fears: that it’s feminine to take care of your feet, or classist to pay someone to scrub them, or perverted to enjoy when they’re rubbed.

Lisa didn’t just remove my dead skin. She gave me a thicker one, too. – Chris Jones