04. A Bridge You Must Cross
“Quest for Spirit”
1,682 words. Approximate reading time: 8 minutes, 24 seconds. Audio version here.
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* * *
Despite the literal warning signs that we passed on the road to the beach, we were still somehow surprised when we were greeted at the end of Pier 13 by a large penis-that is to say, a man wearing a t-shirt and nothing else. He smiled and waved at Tyler, Marie, and me, and we smiled and waved back as we passed by him on our way to the beach.
“Wow,” Tyler said, “That sign wasn’t kidding when it said, ‘Warning! You may encounter nude sunbathers at Pier 13!’”
“Did you know about this?” Marie asked me.
“Nope,” I replied. “There were a bunch of five-star reviews of this hike on the app, but no one actually wrote out anything.”
“Well, whatever,” she said. “It’s still a beautiful afternoon and the beach is gorgeous and, well... I mean, a penis is a penis is a penis. I’ve seen plenty before; it’s not really a big deal.”
We continued hiking down the shore, passing a few couples that were also out on the beach. Strangely enough, every woman was completely covered nearly from head-to-toe, and every man had on a shirt and no bottoms. I guess this is the nude sunbathing dress code for men, covering up your chest and letting your bottom half go free, like some sort of topsy-turvy world. I also guess that the men were a little more excited about the idea of nude sunbathing than the women.
Tyler spoke up. “You know, I don’t think I’d mind coming back here with just Sean and doing a little nude sunbathing of our own.” He gave me a little wink and I chuckled a bit.
Marie said, “Hell, I don’t care! Dicks are all the same pretty much; we could strip down right now and enjoy the rest of our hike au naturel.”
My heart skipped a beat and I pretended I didn’t hear that.
* * *
When we entered the Canaveral National Seashore area, we didn’t have the option to pay for a day pass; it was “pay for a week or turn around and get out of here you filthy hippies.” So I paid the twenty bucks to get us in, even though we only were going to get a few hours’ use out of it.
Unfortunately, that meant we ended up with a pass that was good for the entire week, and I had some time off of work coming up, so Tyler suggested that we get our money’s worth and come back. And by “come back,” he specifically meant to Pier 13, where we could get our nude beach life on. I, ever the cheapskate, agreed, because I’d be damned if I was going to spend twenty bucks to hike on the beach for an hour.
I spent the next few days looking at myself in the mirror, mapping out every imperfection, flexing my muscles in a senseless effort to make my flab look a little more... palatable to the senses. Tyler spent the next few days getting more and more excited about being naked on the beach.
I ordered us some new beach towels and tried to get myself excited about it, too. But, for all of my blustering, I’ve never really been a very brave guy. And for all of my memories of the seashore packed to the gills with regular-looking people, for all of my rationalizations that I am not the center of the universe, for all of my meditations on the fact that no one is there to ogle or ridicule my body, I was still nervous. I told myself that I was prepared for this, that I was going to do this, only to have a little voice inside me say, “You’re not gonna do it. Wuss.”
When the day arrived, I anxiously packed my bag with our beach towels, some snacks and drinks, and some sunscreen. I’d like to say I decided that I was going to be brave, and just let loose and have some fun. After all, we were going to be hours from anyone that we knew, and I had to believe that anyone that patronizes a nude beach is accustomed to seeing all different types of naked bodies. I’d like to say that, but I still hadn’t decided yet. I still wasn’t sure if I could actually do it or not.
It’s funny, having to rationalize the idea of being natural in nature. Having to tell yourself, “It’s okay to be naked.”
* * *
When I was a kid, I couldn’t stand wearing clothes. And I loved nature, in my own special way. I have vague memories of being a toddler and going outside to play with Josh, a neighbor boy that was around the same age. The second we were both outside, all of our clothes would immediately come off and we would sit around playing in the grass and the mud (I’m sure my parents absolutely loved that), eating dirt, you know, the kinds of things that stupid kids do.
At home, I was always running around in just my underwear. I probably would have been naked all the time at home, too, if my parents hadn’t compromised with me and told me that I didn’t have to wear clothes as long as I wore underwear. But, knowing me, I’m sure even that was a struggle most of the time.
It wasn’t until I was around nine or ten years old that I started getting really chubby. I was fairly average-sized up to around that point, although I was still a little bit bigger than my peers, because I remember being made fun of as a kid for being a little fat. My interests as a kid were mainly reading and cooking. I liked playing outside with my friends when we lived in a neighborhood that had a bunch of other kids around the same age as my sister and me, but I could (and frequently did) spend all day with my nose buried in a book, only stopping to grab a snack from the kitchen to tide me over through the next few chapters.
When I was nine, we moved from that neighborhood into a new construction development far away from all of my friends, and there weren’t any other kids in the neighborhood yet, so I didn’t have much to do with myself other than read and cook (and eat).
I made some new friends at my new school using my patented “self-deprecating humor” method. I found that people enjoyed it when I would make fun of how chubby I was, when I would laugh at the jokes made at my expense. People like people who can make and take jokes, so I let my skin crystallize in an effort to be liked. It worked to a degree, but I recall many moments spent in front of the bathroom mirror after a shower, analyzing my body and wishing that it could somehow be different, that people would look at me and not laugh.
And for all of my preaching of “not giving a shit what others think about me,” I carried that with me into adulthood.
* * *
So there we were again, just Tyler and me, in the parking lot outside of Pier 13. When we pulled in, I saw at least ten other cars parked there, and felt a lump in my throat. I had been hoping that maybe at eleven o’clock in the morning on weekday, we’d have a little bit more privacy. But we were here and Tyler was excited, so I shoved my nervousness down.
We unloaded our supplies from the car, and crossed the parking lot to the boardwalk. It was a beautiful day, with the sun high in the bright blue sky, and unseasonably warm, but not deathly hot like most days in Florida. Honestly, it couldn’t have been a more perfect day for nude sunbathing, which is probably why the parking lot was so full.
We moved quickly down the boardwalk and onto the bustling beach, looking through all of the different bodies to find a place to lay down our beach towels. Once we found a nice open area, we set up our little camp. Tyler immediately and excitedly jumped out of his clothes, and my eyes followed his cute little bare butt as he made his way into the ocean.
“This is amazing!” he shouted to me from his spot in the water. I absent-mindedly dug a few toes into the sand as I watched him having the time of his life. I glanced around and saw so many people without a care in the world, laying on their towels soaking up the sun, swimming in the ocean and enjoying the beautiful weather, walking along the shore with only their t-shirts on.
And I noticed that no one was looking at me. And I noticed that no one was looking at Tyler. Everyone was just doing their own thing, living their best life, and God damn it, I could live my best life, too. I looked at Tyler again, watching him splash around for a moment before coming back up to shore, naked and dripping.
He flopped down onto his towel and looked at me as I fussed over our portable radio. “What are you still doing with all of your clothes on? Come on, stop futzing around with that radio and get comfortable!”
The little voice in my head said, “You can’t do it. Wimp. These people are going to judge you. You’re too fat for the nude beach. Your body is an embarrassment.” I took another look around at the other beach-goers, and how free and happy they looked. At how free and happy I could be if I just pushed that little voice aside.
So I pushed that little voice aside. I let my inner child take over. I pulled my shirt up over my head and tossed it onto the beach towel. Okay, so far, so good. Just like any other day at the beach.
“That’s it, babe, you got this!” Tyler encouraged me.
I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and hooked my thumbs underneath the waistband of my swim trunks. ‘No going back now,’ I thought, and let myself be free.