Compensating?

    The other day I was on a one lane road behind a luxury SUV for a while.  Not so remarkable in the town that I was riding through.  But something about the car did catch my attention.  In a place of prominence on the rear window were four college stickers- Brown, Cornell, Princeton University and Columbia.  Very impressive.  But as I sat at the light I started to wonder...
     The placement of the stickers was interesting - straight up the middle. Big decals.  Occupying almost the entire center of the back window.  They had to obscure the driver's vision a bit but I guess a clear sight line isn't as important as making sure we know how fabulous her family is. And I started to think, "Boy, she must be low on self confidence to feel the need to shove that in our faces!"  (See that?  Our faces.  You weren't even there and you're lumped in with me judging total strangers AND making up cruel half-truths about them.  Geez!  I'm so disappointed in you...)
     Anyway, so WE sat there judging her  and wondering did she have four fabulous offspring?  Or two  wonderkids sprung from two brilliant parents?  And then I started feeling bad for her poor unrecognized child who went to a state school but who doesn't get to have a sticker...  I know I'm making her/him up but every thing can't be that perfect.   OR maybe they ARE all brilliant but have vestigial tails.  Awww, poor things.  No wonder she has to crow to the world about them.  To make up for their tails, webbed feet and extra nipples... Can't fault her for  that.  Any mother would do that...
     So, in the period of time I was traveling behind this car, I cycled through different mindsets.  Impressed, irked, sympathetic.  So the question is, who really has a problem here?  A confidence issue?  Possibly the lady with the stickers but probably the lady in the minivan behind her...
   

New Bathing Suit Woes

            In MomSuit, I told you about my desire to ditch the skirted suit.  I finally found an “acceptable” suit just before my family was leaving on a beach vacation.  We were going with extended family for a week.  The kids would have cousins to play with, I would have grownups to chat with and I would be able to try out my new bathing suit.  How’s that for excitement? A bathing suit?  (I need a job…)

            After a long drive, we checked into our rental and decided to wait until the next morning for our first swim.  Everyone was excited to see family and, as a bonus, a sea turtle nest was hatching that night!  Under a full moon, we got to be part of a crowd that watched the little babies scuttle toward the water!  It was amazing!  Volunteer naturalists created a trench to the sea and we were able to crouch along the sides and help steer any errant babies back in the right direction.  What a start to a vacation!

            The next morning, we were all still on a turtle high as we suited up.  My husband and I sun blocked our kids with lotion and spray and zinc sticks.  It was exhausting!  Finally we headed down to the water.  It was a great day.  The kids romped in the surf with their cousins, I chatted along with family and I survived the bathing suit unveiling.  I wore my new separate shorts to the beach, took them off and didn’t die of embarrassment.  (Though I quickly settled myself into a chair and tried not to look fleshy.)

            There is a problem with making the transition from skirted to not-skirted.  There are bits of me that haven’t seen the sun in years.  I had ghostly upper thighs and was tanned (tanned for me is the shade of a manila folder) from above the knee down.  It was not the best look.  I decided that this was a perfect time to fix my pigment problem.  I know…you already know how this is going to end but I am going to tell you anyway…

            I decided I would sit with no sunblock for a little while.  Then apply some to my darker bits.  Then block all of me.  Sure. That would work if I weren’t easily so distracted, if I ever followed all the way through with my plans…  Everyone started talking and catching up and I forgot to sunblock as soon as I intended.  And when I eventually did, I went boogie boarding and scraped/ washed all the block off!  And the parts that managed to get/stay sun blocked were sprayed.  (I’m not very good with the sprayer.  I usually wind up striped.) 

            So, I burned.  But I think burned is too mild a word for what I did.  I charred?  I seared? I scorched? It was bad.  I have Irish/Scottish skin so you know this wasn’t the first time I burned.  (Despite my best efforts and 100 SPF I can always manage to at least pinken.)  This wasn’t even the worst burn I ever had- there were no blisters.  But it was the most miserable burn I ever had.  People, I burned my upper thighs and my armpits.  (“Armpits?!” you cry.  Yes, I had my arms over my head for a while thinking about how the upper parts of my arms are always darker…)

            Somehow I managed to burn all sides of my thighs.  Front, side and back.  Now, when you burn your back, you can sleep on your stomach but there is no escaping your thighs.  You sit on them, you sleep on them, shorts touch them and you have to move them constantly.  Every motion killed.  I cursed changing my clothes, moaned every time I changed position and groaned at the thought of going back to the beach.  It was the first day!  Way to suck the fun out of vacation…

            So with my new bathing suit, I spent the rest of the vacation dressed like a vampire at the beach- covered from head to toe and sitting in the shade.  The touch of sunlight on my burned bits killed.  The sun would only touch me now as I scuttled quickly from the shade to the surf.   I found that the sweet, cool ocean water was so soothing.  I spent a lot of time in the water that week finding relief.  (But, alas, not boarding.  If you catch a good wave, it drags you on the sand at the end.  Tried it once and my thigh skin almost fell off…) 

            I don’t know why I always burn on vacation.  You’d think after all these years I’d know what I was doing.  But, no, I always get distracted or… or stupid?  It’s like the sun goes right to my brain.  Then to my armpits and thighs…  Sigh.  Though my husband thinks I am exaggerating, I am convinced that I damaged my nerves.  (Humor me.)  So, if you see me around town scratching my thighs or armpits, don’t judge me.  Remember its just my nerve endings regenerating…

P.S.  Here's a mental picture for you that I forgot to include:  Me shopping at Walmart trying to discreetly press my frozen foods into my scorched armpits.   (Not sure why I was being discreet.  It was far from the weirdest thing going on in Walmart that day!!)

Mom Suits

(This is really for the moms…)

            When you have a baby, there is a lot of paperwork.  Insurance forms, hospital forms, the birth certificate stuff and the Skirted Bathing Suit Clause.  Don’t remember that one?  They slip it in between the others.  But I am pretty sure it’s some kind of a law.  Or maybe something they whispered over the room’s PA in the night?  For whatever reason, moms today are compelled to wear those skirted/shorted bathing suits.  (If YOU don’t wear these kinds of suits:  1.  You were walking the halls when they came in with the clause.  2. You are deaf and so couldn’t hear the subliminal instructions.  3.  I hate you.)

Back in the old days I used to wear bathing suits without all the extra fabric.  The only people who wore a skirted suit were old.  Not my daughter’s version of old (that would be me) but actually older- like 70. I fretted about my body back then and wrapped myself in towels and giant t-shirts. (Now I wish for that body!)  When I saw my first skirted mom suit, I was happy!  Yippee!  Camouflage for all the bodily changes motherhood had forced upon me! 

My first “mom suit” actually had shorts and they were wonderful.  As a mom to young children, you cannot lay on a chaise in those poses that make your thighs look smaller.  (You know exactly what I am talking about.  Keep those knees bent!) As a mom, you have to chase around small people who insist on trying to do great bodily harm to themselves.  You need a workhorse of a bathing suit.  One that won’t “malfunction” when you are chasing short ones away from the pool edge.  Or when you are leaping great distances to stop sand ingestion. Or when you are carrying more supplies than a Himalayan Sherpa AND a slippery, sun blocked, sweaty toddler just to get to the pool!  Those are a “mom suit’s” greatest moments…

But those years are now in the past for me.  I can actually relax a little more.  (Now my job is morphing into mentally grueling from physically grueling.  Damned kids.)  Now, when I go in the water, shirts and shorts bubbling up around me are annoying.  And when I come out, they are plastered to me and they keep me soggy for so much longer.  Are they flattering when they are flipped up and askew?  I don’t think so.  If I am running for a towel to cover up anyway do I really still need the mom suit?

So this year, I decided to try something new.  I was going to get a bathing suit. A regular bathing suit!   Okay, not really regular.  I had a lot of rules.  Tankini, good straps so I could bogie board without flashing, and a separate pair of shorts!  Okay, this sounds a lot like the mom suit.  Maybe it just seems like semantics but I was going to have to dash to the water without fabric covering my upper thighs.  That’s scary!  But I was ready to do this.  I hit the stores in May.  And June. And July.  And decided that the military should use bathing suit shopping to torture female prisoners into giving up national secrets...

I tried to be open-minded and took lots of suits into many dressing rooms.  I should’ve made an audio recording of those trips.  All around me women were sighing, snorting in disgust and groaning.  (And if you are a guy who made it this far, we were in our own little rooms with our own miseries.  No pillows, nighties or tickle fights.)  Sometimes there were women complaining to their friends over the wall and sometimes they were on the phone while trying things on.  (They really were.  I am not that coordinated.)  One day, I could hear the woman next to me saying loudly, “Oh my God!” and, a few minutes later, even more distressed, “OH. MY. GOD!”  I felt terrible- assuming that she had just received a phone call about some family tragedy or was with a friend who had a terrible life.  As I exited my stall, she came out of hers.  She was alone.  No phone in her hand- just a handful of rejected suits.  Our eyes met and we sighed together.  Victims of cruel spandex and neon lighting.

In the eleventh hour, just before our family vacation, I found a suit.  I’d like to say it masked all of my body’s shortcomings but it didn’t.  But I felt like I could dash from my chair to the water without dying of embarrassment.  Let’s count that as- Victory!!  

But there’s always a catch… Come back to hear the rest...

Oh Canada!

(No complaining about the topic!)

A while ago, my husband and I were watching a news program that was covering some protests about something in the US.  Real specific, huh?  It might have been the Occupy protests…  I don’t really remember but I do remember the conversation that followed…

Me:  You know, we never hear about people protesting in Canada.  Why does Canada never have these problems?

J:        Because they have no passionate people in Canada.  They only let in people who are well behaved and who have no passions.   

I laughed (and wondered about their immigration paperwork). 

Recenetly, I was checking out the news (aka stupid internet stuff) and stumbled onto this.  It made me laugh out loud.  I have no idea if it’s faked (probably) but it seems J. is not the only one who thinks this!