Conversation between me and my parents
We were talking about the upcoming Hawaii trip.
Mom: Your father and I have already started tanning. Have you?
Me: No, you know I don't do that. I don't get tan, I just get red.
Mom: I just don't understand that. I mean, I tan and so does your father.
(Pretty sure this is because they baked themselves to death in their youth.)
Dad: She's just not trying hard enough.
Mom: Yeah, that could be it. Maybe your skin knows that you're not really committed.
Me: Oooooor, maybe my skin just doesn't like melanoma.
This is not the first time I've had such conversations with my parents. I wouldn't be surprised to find them swapping out my SPF 70 with something like baby lotion. Just to show me that I could tan if I really wanted to.
And maybe they'll tell me that I really should consider smoking. You know, because it's cool and good for you.
I'm Steph, a librarian and mom of 3 (not sure how that happened). Let's chat books, food, Sumptuous Literary Adaptations, poop, knitting and maybe some crazy Mormon Feminism.
15 comments:
I'm pretty much an albino. With freckles. But I must admit that I will ocassionally go to the tanning salon because it is the ONLY way I can get a little color. Especially when my mom plans family pictures for the dead of winter. I don't want to look dead. My sweet hubby (who was sometimes mistaken for a Brazilian on his mission he is so dark) hates it when I tan, so it is the one thing I'm sneaky about in our marriage. And how much chocolate I eat.
i, too, am hopelessly pale. however, i don't feel too bad about it anymore. my dad used to cheer me up when i was a teen (and cared about things like that) by saying: "Heavenly Father and Jesus didn't appear to Joseph Smith with a tan."
Somehow I reached back into the gene pool and pulled out some tanning ability. Joe however can turn beach-body bronze by standing under fluorescent lights in a thin t-shirt. No fair! My kids, thankfully, are also little brown ones.
I do like to go tanning once or twice before summer though. I figure that 15 minutes of tanning bed is better than hours and hours in the sun, plus it keeps me from burning later
I love that your parents are tanning and encouraging you to tan. It's like you live in an alternate universe or something...
Smoking :) That does make sense too ... you might want to start now so your lungs will be adapted for the foreign tourists and bars.
I've never understood the tanning preparation argument either. If it's so you can go without sunscreen then ok - I can see how you would enjoy being able run straight into the surf from the convertible without slathering yourself. But unless you plan deep fry your skin in uv every day your going to have to use sunscreen anyway.
FYI If you aren't in the sun for 20 minutes a day you probably don't get enough vitamin D. And dairy products besides milk don't have vitamin D added. I take a 1000 iu supplement so I can stay a healthy pasty white.
I heart sunscreen. I think we need to direct mom and dad to dooce's posts where she shows her skin cancer.
I'm sure if they went into the dermatologist the Dr would probably drop dead right there.
The kids and Ed think it is hilarious that when I come in from the sun I have noticeably more freckles. Some people need to get lives.
Check out this link:
http://inthemotherhood.msn.com/
Go to season 1, episode 2. There is a tanning bit in there that is just hilarious. Actually, these are all so funny. If you know moms or love kids.
I heard smoking tans you from the inside.
So there's that.
You know, if they keep bothering you, and you need to placate them, you can get the spray on tan, which most fake-n-bake places do in lieu of the actual fake-n-bake.
One of my sisters was for decades convinced that the pasty white genes our family is 'blessed' with was unacceptable, so it was sun sun sun for her all the time. Now, if you lined up strangers to pick out the older one of us, they will pick her 100% of the time (I'm 5 years older); in fact, she looks 5+ years older than me. She pursued tanning even though our first cousin died of melanoma at age 26. Taint worth it!
Wow, this is bizarre to me. All of my life and still to this day, my mother is always reminding me to 'stay out of the sun, wear a wide brimmed hat, wear sunglasses and put on more sunscreen.' Protecting your skin from the damages of the sun is the key to healthy young looking skin. She never goes into the sun without protection. Her skin looks great, which I think is why people often mistake her for my older sister and not my mother.
I, too, only burn.
Did you see that episode of "Seinfeld" where Kramer lathers butter all over himself to get a better tan, then falls asleep in the sun? And Newman keeps smelling the cooking butter and envisioning Kramer as a turkey? Classic.
My poor sweet mom feels she's been maligned, here. I should point out that she does very much care about my health and my skin and everything. Also she wears SPF 25 on her face every day in Alaska, where there isn't even any sun. And now you know.
I was one of those people who could tan, but with a price: usually in the form of blisters. I had one of those carcinoma thingy's cut out of me and that cured that.
Hard to believe we used to use baby oil as suntan lotion. And those foil things you'd hold under your face.
Ow.
The interesting thing about the effect of UV on the skin is that its effect is cumulative. So if you think that burning yourself a little bit lots of times is OK, think again. It may eventually catch up with you.
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