Nekkid, Clueless and Feelin' Good: June 15, 2001

Friday,
June 15, 2001

My God, where did that tan come from?

Last night turned out to be a bit of a bust when it came to nattering -- by the time Patrick came home, I was too tired to do much of anything but sprawl on the couch and watch his DVD of THE TENTH KINGDOM while lusting absentmindedly over the luscious Scott Cohen.

This morning was a big improvement, though -- we went out to brunch with our friends David and Sarah for a lovely meal of pancakes and info exchanges about everybody I still know in town. Midway through the meal, Sarah and Partick started their patented show again -- put Patrick with someone sharp and hilarious like Stacy or Sarah, start a tape recorder, and I swear you'll have an award-winning comedy album within an hour. I almost choked on my pancakes a couple of times.

After that and a brisk walk around the mall to work off breakfast, I headed up to Orland Park and Stacy's, and made one heck of a discovery. I'd completely forgotten about the dangers of hanging your arm out of the window while driving long-distance (and no, I'm not talking about amputation by auto, smartass). My left forearm has a wonderful crispy golden coating right now, a subtle glow of health that looks like something out of a Coppertone ad.

My left upper arm, however, is a mass of raw meat. Mainly because I already had the beginnings of a tan, the tanned parts just got deeper; the pale white flesh of my upper arm, exposed to the sun and wind as my shirtsleeve kept flying up, just got roasted good and proper. It hasn't started blistering yet, but from the general temperature (aka flamingly hot) and feel (unpleasantly dry and loose) that's only a matter of time.

So it seems that Mellie will be wearing a t-shirt while in the pool this weekend. Yes, you read that correctly -- Stacy has a lovely 5-foot pool in her backyard and since both Clara and Tony are water fanatics we'll be spending a goodish amount of time back there.

The nice thing, however, is that we don't have to be in the pool just because the kids are. Apparently there are now these cute little float suits for little kids -- they're like bathing suits with big blocks of foam sandwiched in the material on the front and back, and they allow the kids to bob like corks on the surface (you can see Stacy stuffing Clara into her suit at left -- all the little neighborhood girls have something like this so that they can go swimming at the Tomaseks). With this, we can sit at the patio table and relax while Clara indulges in her favorite activity -- climbing up the ladder and leaping into the water over and over again, giggling all the time.

Of course, this sort of thing runs in the family -- back in prehistoric times, I was the only kid in the neighborhood who could spend hours outside and not get a shred of a tan because I was underwater all the time. I loved swimming, especially underwater -- it was the closest thing to flying, and for a chubby little girl who was painfully aware of her lack of physical coordination, it was wonderous to have that sort of three-dimensional freedom.

So now the next generation are indulging in it, and it's a pleasure to sit and watch them do so. Of course, it's even more fun to climb in and do it myself. I just have to remember to wear this stupid t-shirt.

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