Me (on the left),
Topless. 8.1959
There are so many things I love about this photo. I was 28 mos. old. I'm in a washtub with two other cousins, both slightly older. Three babies in a washtub. Isn't that grand? Apparently, Frankie, the fourth (and the outsider) was still in diapers so he wasn't allowed.
I love that we are all completely innocent of our (almost) nakedness. I'm not sure when you become aware of your body .. or it's differences with the opposite sex, but that little window of innocence is precious.
I do remember when I first became aware of my breasts and that they were changing. I was in my grandmother's bed. It was summer, it was HOT and I was sleeping in as little as possible with a box fan blowing on me. My hands brushed my boobies and it was like, "WHOA! .. what was that?" Not long after I started having passionate battles with my mother over wearing my cousin's (the other little girl in the tub, in fact!) hand-me-down bras. So intense were these exchanges I even tried to enlist the help of my older brother. For the record, he wasn't much help at all.
Growing boobies conjures a plethora of mixed emotions. It hurts, for one thing. It separates you from the boys for another. They show through your school dresses which is HIGHLY embarassing .. Those early experiences with boobies were NOT pleasant.
Even later .. I wasn't pleased about their arrival. I thought they were too perky. Yes, you read that right. I snuck looks at my Daddy's Playboy magazines and all the boobies in there looked completely different. And perfect. Mine were .. too new.
Frankly, I never did get what all the hoopla was about regarding the male fascination with boobies. I only thought they were truly wonderful when they provided nutrition for my babies. But, by then, their function was utilitarian and their form .. well .. not-so-perky any more.
Perhaps my best, most favorite experience with my boobies (and the rest of me) was when I was 38. I was on a guide-only canoe trip on the Pecos river as it flows in west Texas. ("Guide only" meaning no cow-towing to clients and everybody pulled their own weight.)
It was a ten day trip which afforded us layovers in some of the most picturesque (blue water, limestone bluffs) places. All but Dave and I had taken a long hike. Dave was up at the kitchen spot napping under an overhang in the shade. I took myself downstream and got naked. The sun was burning and the water freezing so I alternated between sitting in swift water and baking on an adjacent boulder. Buck-assed naked. I only wonder why it took me so long in life to do that. It was the first time my boobies had seen the sun. They liked it.
I loved it.
Mostly I loved that I was skinny-dipping and no one knew it but me.
Later, the others returned and almost everyone else went skinny dipping but I held my solitary dip to myself and just WATCHED.
Thank you, Pecos river, for giving me (and my boobies) that experience.
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