Sunbathing

[BlueTrain]

I always envied people who could get a nice tan in the summer, irrespective of whether or not it was "all over." One neighbor even claimed that if you got a nice tan in the summer, you wouldn't get a cold in the winter. I'm not sure if their theory held or not, because their son, my age, was always sniffling. But he usually had a good tan. I started life with red hair, same as my wife and my mother (my father had black hair!). So getting a tan for me was always been problematic.

Yet, it seems like it used to be one of the central tenets of nudism, 1950s style. You had to get a nice all-over tan or there was no point to it, unless you were a dedicated volleyball player. At least the old nudist magazines, the ones in color, certainly featured well-tanned individuals.

Is anybody here a dedicated sun-worshipper who makes a point of getting a good tan every summer? And if so, do you ever catch colds?

[Greenbare Woods]

I have always gotten immeasurably bored laying quietly on a beach or somewhere to get an all over tan.  I go out into the sunshine and get more tan on my shoulders, arms, and upper body than the lower shaded parts. 

Having lots of natural Vitamin D is important for good health.  Fresh air and sunshine helps people to stay healthy.   

[BlueTrain]

I've reached a point when lying quietly somewhere is a very nice thing to do, but not in the sun. I think I bleach out in the sun.

[jbeegoode]

Relaxation and a strategy for stress reduction keep a body from running down, like a good nights sleep. All of this has to do with maintaining a good tan.

I do lots of things to keep healthy and I stay away from places frequented by infectious diseases these days.

I haven't had a cold in years since I started getting rest and warm sun naked. I think that it is the rest thing mostly and rich diet. When young, I got into a fast food diet and got sick in many ways, including a cold. When I feel rundown, I feel a cold coming on, my immunities are not as effective.

A rest in the sun with a good book is rejuvenating. The sun is warm and warm is good for a body. I can feel that. In cold, my body tightens up, which is a stressor. I sweat and scrape my skin to detox. The heat is good, proven. The sun has the same effect, but one doesn't always feel that when the air cools and evaporates.

The all over rich tan that I strive for keeps me from sunburn. In careful increments a deeper and deeper all over tan makes me impervious to burn. I feel better, my skin looks more healthy as it hides belmishes, etc. when I have a deeper protective base coat tan, I don't have to wear clothes at all, and then I feel more liberated. I'm a naked person and naked feels wonderful and free. It means less stress for me.

Recreation and vacation is getting away from stress. When I recreate of vacation nude, I'm even less stressed.

Spiritual activities can be coping with stress. For me, My spirituality brings me nude and then less stress occurs.

There is a cold season. I make a point of living in a place where relative summer is most of the time. Still in Tucson there is a cold season and a virus season. I make a point of maintaining a tan all year. It fades, It needs upkeep, but it is worth the efforts. Still in teh spring, after the colder times, like Febuary, I must be careful as my faded less easily maintained tan is faded and I can get surprised.

I'm careful, especially the shoulders and nose, which get direct beams. Maybe not shaded so much, for me, but direct beams hit certain parts more, especially when lying down.


DF tans easy and rarely can burn at all. I am nearly jealous, but I cope. So, maybe I can empathize to some extent how it may be for a red head. I just have to be twice as careful as DF. A red head has to be even more careful.

So, yes, sun and tanning in it, living in it, keep the colds away. And yes, I love the sun and being in it and make a point of maintaining a good tan, which I do mostly when upright.

Jbee

[BlueTrain]

Nice post. But what do you mean by a rich diet?

[jbeegoode]

Nice post. But what do you mean by a rich diet?

Sounds like a lot of chocolate cake, doesn't it?

I eat lots of varieties of foods and they are mostly pretty fresh and mostly raw. I get the most nutrition when food is not cooked or lightly cooked. I make effort to get organic from good soils. I also like pizza a lot, so I'm implying that I get a wide variety of foods. I get some super foods in there, hemp meal, I grow moringa in my yard, weird stuff with the goods packed into it. Fruit and veggie vitamin C is high.

So "rich" means lots of nutrients, quality, variety.
Jbee

[BlueTrain]

I think that these days, "organic" means little more than that it contains no petroleum products and I'm not too sure about that. But I quit worrying about nutrition years ago, if I ever did. At my age, you realize there's no point in worrying about it and, after all, the worry is the bad part.

At the moment, I have a pot of pinto beans simmering on the stove. Are they organic? Darned if I know. And tonight, I'll eat them with hot dogs from Smithfield, Virginia. Are they organic? Wouldn't bet on it. They're not kosher, either.

[Peter S]

“Rich” food over here implies a lot of sugar and/or fat content. Go back into culinary history and once that sort of content would only be available to the rich, so maybe that’s where the term stems from. “Organic” is defined as grown without the use of any form of man-made chemicals, fertilisers or pesticides (the use of the word organic is policed by the Soil Association, who promote and monitor organic food production. Given the efficacy of all those chemicals at improving crop and animal yields, organic foodstuffs tend to be more expensive and so have an aura of “for the well-off”.

There’s even a movement afoot promoting “ancient grains”. Mass production has reduced the use of strains of wheat etc to those which are the highest yielding (for obvious economic reasons), but less efficient strains are now being rediscovered and used for bread that only the rich can afford on a regular basis.

Perhaps the new definition of “rich” food needs to be the food that used to be for the poor.

[BlueTrain]

My impression was the rich foods were those that, if consumed to excess, resulted in gout, the only ailment worth admitting that you had.

There are fads in food, although organic food probably isn't one of them. The first one that comes to mind is quinoa, which is a grain that originated in South American mountain areas. It's popularity, however, has resulted in it becoming too expensive for the people who grow it. But it is now grown in the United States and Europe. Other food fads around here include crepes and quiche.

[nuduke]

Returning to Blue train's original point - It has always been a source of great sadness to me that I don't tan.  I always think that a vaguely olive skin looks healthy and the quality of tanned people's skin is more appealing.  Mine's paper white and has a strong tendency to dryness.  This may be a case of 'the other man's grass is greener' but, like Blue Train, I envy those lucky people who go brown in no time on holiday or even in the garden and seem immune to the boredom and discomfort of sunbathing.  I find the sun quite uncomfortable on my skin after only a short time with or without sunblock and burn easily.  Trouble is I like being in the sunshine and sunny weather!
John

[BlueTrain]

I've mentioned that I enjoy nude hiking. But even though that means that I'm outside for hours on end, most of the places I've hiked (nude, that is) are in shady places. In fact, the Appalachian Trail has been referred to as a green tunnel. It really is in some places, too, as are other nearby trails.

[John P]

The idea of sunbathing just doesn't appeal to me, if it means lying around with the deliberate aim of getting a tan. If I'm having a lazy time, I always feel more comfortable in the shade. On the other hand, if I'm out walking or canoeing, I don't mind picking up some color, and in a way I think of it as a souvenir of summer until it fades. I don't burn very easily (my grandfather was Italian) but if I'll be out in the sun for a while, especially in early summer, I'll use sunscreen, without being obsessive about it.

Unfortunately sun exposure is yet another reason why my wife doesn't want to be a naturist. She's blonde and has skin that's easily irritated, and she received a very powerful lesson when her older sister died of melanoma about 5 years ago. I asked what they did about sun exposure when they were young (in upstate New York) and she said, basically nothing, and they got sunburned fairly often. We're keeping our fingers crossed. I make jokes about "triple digit sunscreen".

There's a pretty active naturist from New York (he was on the Solstice Hike and at the Eastern Naturist Gathering, and in the Philadelphia World Naked Bike Ride) who has red hair and fair skin, and he told us that as a kid he "Spent every summer red as a lobster". He's had some incredible number of malignant growths removed--did he really say over 100? A lot, anyway. You'd think he'd look scarred and pitted, but apparently they're small enough to heal, so he looks OK. He gets checked frequently!

[BlueTrain]

I had one removed a few weeks ago and I think there are a couple more the doctor will want to attend to. Oddly enough, there were none on my back or shoulders, which are the places that received the worst sunburns. One of the things they ask on your first visit is whether anyone else in the family ever had melanoma, which none had. But as I like to point out, nobody in my family (including all my antecedents) ever died of cancer but they're all dead just the same.

I think that exposure to the air and the wind is as important as exposure to sunlight. But you could probably live your whole life indoors with no harm, either.