Naked (36 page)

“It’s to keep the hairs off the furniture,” Roberta said. “Personally, I’d just as soon suck it up with a Dustbuster, but
what the fuck. To each his own. You might save a little time on the cleaning, but when you consider all those hours spent
shaving, I don’t know that it’s really all that efficient. Maybe it’s better to just buy a sofa that matches your hair color,
that way you can forget about both the shaving
and
the cleaning. That’s what I’ve done and I ain’t hearing no complaints, right, Duke?”

This was my last morning at the nudist park. Returning from the sauna last night, I saw a naked woman run from my trailer
and jump into a waiting car. It had been Roberta, and she’d left a note, inviting me to join her and Duke for breakfast. Before
arriving here, I tried to imagine what it might be like to go to someone’s house for a meal. According to my mother, it was
fine to use your plate as an ashtray but under no circumstances should you ever enter anyone’s home bare-foot. With this in
mind, I wore sneakers and, on the off chance they dressed for meals, carried a canvas bag I’d packed with a towel, shirt,
and a pair of shorts. I arrived to find my hosts seated naked in their kitchenette playing SuperNintendo and listening to
one of those early-morning wise guys on the radio. Unlike my trailer, which was grounded to the earth, theirs was designed
to be pulled behind a car, and it sat parked upon a tiny lawn, its wheels blocked with bricks so that it wouldn’t roll down
the hill.

“Why so formal?” Duke asked. “Take off your shoes and stay awhile.”

We wedged ourselves around a tiny built-in table, and Roberta presented a pillow-size omelette, filled, she said, “with all
kinds of shit. There might even be some cat litter in here, for all I know. We left the fuckers back at our apartment in town
but that stuff has a way of working itself into the damnedest places. Oh well, eat up, everybody.”

Every now and then someone will offer some little bit of information that suddenly changes everything. I asked how many cats
they had, and Roberta pulled out a pencil and notepad. “Let’s see, seventeen plus twelve minus two plus the one that asshole
gave back after it shit on his rug.” She squinted at the paper, struggling with the figures. “Twenty-eight. We had twenty-eight
cats the last time I checked, but that was a few days ago. Coppertone dropped eight kittens last month, and I was trying to
deal with those fuckers when what’s-her-name, the crippled one, had four babies right there on the goddamned bed while Duke
and I were getting it on.”

She shrugged, mystified. “I don’t know where the damn things come from. Got ourselves a bunch of horny cats, I guess. Duke
here drove one of the mothers out into the country and booted her out once he came to a nice-looking farm-house. Thirty miles
he took her, but one week later the little bitch was back shredding up the furniture as if nothing had ever happened. What
can you do?”

A blackened mushroom dropped from my hostess’s mouth and settled onto her breast.

There was with Roberta, and with everyone else I’d met, something larger and more definitive than her nudity. People were
stamp collectors and gardeners, ham radio operators, registered nurses, and big-time pet owners. It was no different than
anywhere else, except that while describing their passions, these people just happened to be naked. They lived in cans rather
than houses and considered themselves fortunate when a warm, sunny day allowed them to leave their homes and walk among people
who shared at least one of their interests. It’s not too much to ask for, and if they’ve accidentally dropped some cat litter
into the omelette, then so be it.

Nudism didn’t cause me to love my body, it simply allowed me to accept my position in what is clearly the scheme of things.
Take a seat beside an eighty-year-old man and you can see the sagging, age-spotted body that awaits you. Rather than inciting
panic, this truth seems to have a calming effect. Marching toward the clubhouse with a multitude of naked strangers, I felt
the proceedings should be narrated by one of those hushed, scholarly voices commonly used for television nature programs.

I’d planned to take a cab to the bus station but was offered a ride by Jacki and Millie. This was the first time in a week
that I had to get dressed. Clothing was no longer optional. Now it was mandatory, and I found myself resenting it. Turn your
back on a pair of pants and things can get nasty. We rode into town, each of us tugging at our clothing. Jacki had a bumper
sticker on her car that read, “Nudist on board!” and I noticed other motorists follow closely before pulling up beside us,
their faces registering profound disappointment. Had we been naked, they probably would have vomited blood. It is ironic that
nudists are just about the last people you’d ever want to see naked.

During the ride into town Millie reflected upon the up-coming sunbathers’ convention set to take place next week in Massachusetts.
“That’s where I married Phil,” she said, referring to her second husband. “My four sons gave me away, just as nude and beautiful
as they could be. They used to be so much fun, my children. We’d go to all kinds of nude parks and beaches, but then they
got older and married clothes-minded girls who won’t have anything to do with my way of life.” She shook her head and scowled
at the passing landscape. “Why did they have to go and marry girls like that? You try to raise them right and look what happens.”

This was the lament of any parent. You try to raise your children right, and look what happens. Jacki had the same problem:
the children she had raised naked now spent all their money on clothes. They’d never even seen her new trailer. How had it
happened? When had they decided it was wrong to see their mother naked, standing beside the sink or kneeling to wipe out the
inside of a garbage can? Was it a specific event that had set them off?

“Beats me,” Millie said. “Maybe I’ll ask them that question the next time they call asking for money.”

The women dropped me off at the bus station with twenty minutes to spare, and I raced up and down the street, passing college
students in baggy, knee-length shorts and bank tellers wearing navy blue suits. For the first time in what felt like years,
I saw stockings and handbags. Bodies, fat and thin, were packed into slacks and pleated skirts. Every outfit resembled a costume
designed to reveal the aspirations of the wearer. The young man on the curb would like to make the first Olympic skateboarding
team. The girl in the plastic skirt longs to live in a larger town. I found myself looking at these people and thinking,
I know what you look like naked. I can tell by your ankles and the tightness of your belt. The flush of your face, the hair
sprouting from your collar, the way your shirts hang off those bony hips: you can’t hide it from me.

It was as though I’d received the true version of the X-ray specs I’d ordered as a child. The glasses were advertised in the
back pages of comic books and promised the ability to see through clothing. I’d counted the days until they arrived and was
clinically disappointed to discover that I’d been cheated. These were black plastic frames supporting cardboard lenses. The
eyeballs were rendered to appear bloodshot, and the pupils were tiny peepholes backed by plain red acetate. The glasses, when
worn, gave me the look of someone both enthused and exhausted by what he saw. They suggested the manic weariness inherent
in their promise, capturing the moment when the sheen wears off and your newfound gift becomes something more clearly resembling
a burden.