Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Feel More Awesome, Okay?

A couple of weeks ago, some friends and I drove to Waikiki, a nude beach surrounded by yellow cliffs nestled in the forest near Tarragona, because why the hell wouldn't we?

We parked the car and every one immediately needed to pee again because we'd only stopped once along the harrowing eighty-minute journey. We schlepped our crap onto our backs and started walking blindly into the woods. About a minute and a half in, we all found our pee spots. I was in my hiking outfit: an ankle length black dress that doesn't allow my legs to take full strides and wedge-heeled boots. After I gathered the hem up and over my incandescent butt, I couldn't really see or remember what I was doing, but my mother's voice echoed in my head, "Stick your bottom way out." I did that and only peed on my shoe a little.

Melissa lit a cigarette, we took a picture and continued our hike.

After asking for directions several times, contemplating how long we could survive in the wilderness on the provisions we'd brought (we guessed we'd just eat everything outright and hope for the best) and more photos, we eventually found the promised land.

I peeled my shoes off, dug my feet whose second toes are longer than the big toes into the finest sand I'd ever felt and reveled for a second. After we'd snapped out of it, we found our spot and peeled nearly everything else off.

We kept our underwear on, and I'll admit that I was a little relieved because I still haven't figured out the right style for my flaming pubic hair that draws way too much attention. I apologized for my razor burn because I wanted my friends to know that I knew as we eeked our way into the frigid water and gathered my courage to dive into a big wave I knew I wouldn't be able to jump over. While submerged, I felt like millions of lil' baby stingrays were fighting over where to play on my skin, and all those strange bumps on my areolas bubbled up. It felt good, really good.

We quickly got out because we're not heroes, and all the wine, cheese and Kelly's hummus were calling. I tried a few different sitting positions before I was satisfied that my winter gut wasn't spilling over too much. I've always felt a little strange eating without clothes on, but our spread was too good to not; my stomach noticeably expanded. After we finished, Sam took a photo of us holding food over our nipples because we're hilarious. I noticed that I'd forgotten to pluck my two determined nipple hairs as I pasted avocado skins to them.

Thankfully, Poppie brought a small bottle of sun lotion SPF negative number because I'd violated the first rule of ginger club and hadn't packed any. It was better than nothing, so I smeared it over my skin reminding myself for the billionth time that we're embarking on yet another summer I will go through without being a bronzed goddess. It smelled like coconut ambrosia!

We took more photos, did sand cartwheels and waded into in the sea once more because we are the luckiest people on the planet. But sadly, even the luckiest people have to put their clothes on and go meet others in town for a traditional Catalan dinner.

Like real assholes, we fell all over ourselves trying to convey the magic of what we'd just experienced to our friends while they had been working. Flipping through the photos, I felt myself getting a little less excited. I had no idea my thighs and stomach looked so doughy. Hold up, when did I get cellulite? What if my boobs were bigger? Maybe that would balance me out?

You see what I did there?

You just wanted a cool story about an incredible experience that I made infinitely less cool and incredible for you because of my body issues, but I feel like that's what a lot of people, especially women, do to themselves daily. We don't wear what we want to wear, eat what we want to eat, have sex like we want to have sex or go to the damn beach sometimes because we're preoccupied with the 2% that we don't consider perfect instead of the 98% that's banging. We're robbing ourselves of so much feeling awesome time.

And while I remember every negative thought I had about myself that day, I also remember not having a single criticism of my friends' gorgeous bodies even though I knew that they, sadly, were dealing with their own hangups. They're idiots, though. I thought they looked beautiful, confident and sexy.

And you know who else did?

The naked guy who was masturbating behind us the whole time.



I don't remember eating a bowl of fabulous before this hike, but I clearly did.