If you're American, and you didn't grow up in a commune in Berkeley, then you know that America isn't too big on nudity. I can't explain how it's possible that a hundred million people can sit through no less than three blood-and-guts-filled editions of Rambo, and then freak the fuck out at a two second shot of one of Janet Jackson's milkshakes (note: her nip was covered in diamonds). But that's my country - if you own enough guns to outfit an army, then you're awesome, but you better keep your uniform on the whole time, or you're a fucking pervert.
Anyways, I haven't spent too much time out in the world in the buff. I'm fine with being naked behind closed doors with a girlfriend, but as we all know, I rarely have a girlfriend. I've never been to a nude beach. Had they made us take showers after PE in high school, I would have been one of the kids sporting a bathing suit under that cold, cold water. On the rare occasion that I find myself in a gym locker room, I try to expose my privates as little as possible. I don't sun bathe, and if I did, it would be with shorts and a t-shirt on. I don't think my nipples have ever seen the sun. What I'm trying to say here, is that relative to other folks, I've spent hardly any of my life in the state of naked.
Fast forward to this week - I was hanging out with my friend and fellow copywriting American expat Dylan. He's been all over the world, and lived in Hamburg for a year or two, and he showed me this:
Click it, and you'll find a website that shows you a bunch of beautiful public swimming areas throughout Germany. The facilities look beautiful, kind of like old-school public bath houses minus the dirty secret(s).
I'm not a big swimmer... that is to say that I don't actually like it. Pieraccis aren't in-the-water people; we prefer to admire water from afar, never letting it get past our knees, for fear of getting our hair wet. We get this from our mother. Despite my genetics, I swear that one of these days I'm going to learn how to open my eyes under water, and get water in my nose without freaking out, but hey, I'm only 30, so no rush.
So swimming doesn't excite me, but I've always been interested in the concept of a sauna. A super hot room where you sit and relax and think - kind of like Bikram yoga without all that pesky stretching. Then Dylan showed me that one of the places has not only a sauna, but an ice room, where you go after the sauna, and cover yourself in ice. As ball shrinking as that sounds, I can certainly see how refreshing that would be, and how it would force your body to open and close all sorts of capillaries and vessels, thereby fortifying circulation.
The only trick is that - of course - here in Germany, where nudity is WAY more accepted than in America*, you're really only supposed to go in there sans all clothing. Not that there are guards at the door or anything (though that would be perfectly German - I can totally picture German border guards in their scary green uniforms standing by the door, poking at my boxer shorts with a billy club saying "NEIN!"), but if you go in in, say, a bathing suit, you risk being "one of those perverted Turkish guys in the corner, just there to stare at the chicks" (not my description). And I certainly wouldn't want that.
I told Dylan about my nudity nervousness. I said it's because I'm American, and he chuckled. I told him I'm perfectly fine with being naked with my girlfriend, so of course he suggested "Bring your girlfriend!" and then realized how apples and oranges that really is.
So here's the pact I'm willing to make with you, dear readers (both of you). I'm going to go to one of these saunas, and dammit, I'm gettin' naked. I'm going to leave my American anxieties at the door, along with my undies, and be naked with all those other naked people who couldn't give a rat's ass about mine.
* I bet nudity is way more accepted almost everywhere, actually
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