skin to the wind, baby!

I spent most of this past Saturday naked. Nude. In the buff. Sans clothes.

(Image via 9gag)

This little tidbit wouldn't really be blog-worthy if it weren't for the fact that I was also outside. More specifically, outside at Lake O' The Woods Club, a nudist club in Indiana.

A couple months ago, a good friend told me about Chicago Fun Club, a local group of nudies that has what appears to be at least one event a month where they get together, shed the clothes, and frolic about doing any number of things. The plan was to go a couple months ago when my friend made a weekend trip to Chicago but I couldn't quite bring myself to do it. A few weeks later, he told me the Chicago club was meeting up this past Saturday at LOWC for a skinny dipping event and all-around day of hanging out.

And hang all out, we did.

My morning started off on a less than pleasant note and despite the fact that all I really wanted to do was lounge on the couch and watch the one thing that always helps adjust my perspective, I would have felt shitty backing out. So, we hopped in the car and a little over an hour later, arrived at our very first nudist event. Which proved to be exactly what I friggin' needed that day.

Since everyone and their brother can't just pull in, ditch their clothes and roam around the grounds, we were buzzed in by what I imagined was a woman inside somewhere sitting behind a desk completely naked. Once we parked the car, we looked like the oddballs of the group walking toward the clubhouse with our clothes on. Everyone and their brother (and sister and wife and husband and children) were either in the pool or lounging around on the chairs surrounding the pool but there were some people just laying in the grass and some standing around talking with others; all of them, naked. We made our way into the clubhouse to sign in, where we were greeted by the mystery phone voice who buzzed us in, who was indeed, sitting behind a desk naked. She crossed our names off, scanned our driver's licenses, took some general info, and sent us back outside to join in the fun. So, we headed back to my friend's car, ditched our clothes and walked back over toward the clubhouse, finally looking just like everyone else.

We found a little spot to throw down some towels and sat for a bit to take in the sights. There were women who looked much like I do...there were women who were smaller and women who were bigger. Short guys, tall guys, white guys, black guys. I'm not sure, number-wise, how the gender scale tipped but there seemed to be quite a good number of both men and women. We chatted it up with a man from Maine whose family often travels with him but for reasons I can't remember, he was solo this time. We chatted with an Army vet who has been a member of the club for years and years. After swimming in the pool for a bit, because of the torrential downpour, we wound up huddled under a big tent, where we struck up conversation with a few people closer to our ages (we've dubbed the male of the group, "Horse Cock" because...well, yeah. I managed to keep my eyes in check for most of the day but a girl couldn't help but notice that tasty little treat floppin' around all afternoon). Since there wasn't much to be done in the rain, we went inside with them and into the sauna with a few other people to warm up. After which, once the rain stopped, it only made sense to take a swim in the lake, which is, I must say, amazingly fucking delightful after coming out of a sauna. Because I'm firmly in the anti-Mexican food camp, we didn't stay for dinner and left shortly after the skinny dipping.

New people tend to scare me. I'm shy in the sense that meeting new people and making new friends is unpleasantly difficult for me. I hate crowds and I'm not really much of a 'group event' kind of girl and much prefer spending my time with just a few people at once. But I was amazed at how little of a concern that was to me. I suppose it's really no different than people who get together and hang out because they're Cubs fans or Buffy fans or The Flaming Lips fans...there was a common interest between everyone that, at least for me, put me much more at ease than I had expected. There was...a brazen honesty about everyone that I positively adored.

I didn't grow up in a "naked house" but it also wasn't one shrouded in shame. We left bathroom doors open, we brushed our teeth while someone was showering...nakedness was just never that big of a deal. Thankfully, for me, that's carried over into my adult life. I'm not one to wear what most would call "skimpy" clothes when out and about and like a lot of people, there are days when there are parts of my body I'd rather not look at. But if I'm in my apartment, I'm most likely wearing as little as possible. It's just more comfortable. Hell, I have to wear clothes any time I'm outside of my apartment so why the hell would I want to be stuck in them when I'm just hanging out in the privacy of my own home? I don't.

My Saturday morning had started with my body...turning on me and left me wondering exactly what sort of ugliness was lurking around inside. Thankfully, not only am I on the upswing of taking care of that little health bump in the road, but the perfect way to combat that feeling last Saturday was to spend the afternoon being reminded that no matter what may be going on in the inside, the outside...just like everyone else's...remains beautiful.