Body Confidence -- College Style

I have broken away from my minimalism topics these last few entries. I guess I just had other things I wanted to share.  Today's post is about bikini bodies.

Are. you. serious. you're probably saying.  Why would she write about that? 

Humor me over your morning coffee.  I learned something here. 

This week I was with my college boy helping him clean out his house after finals since he will be away over the summer.  We stopped by to see some of his friends while we were in town.  Picture the scene:  college apartment pool the last day of finals.  It's clear skies and 90 Texas degrees.  Cans of beer are cracking open and volleyball is underway.  Lots of teen and twenty something kids are joyfully hanging out with friends and reveling in their no-more-finals selves.

And wearing bikinis.

You're probably thinking, well, they ARE 20.  Probably never had a baby stretch your gut to oblivion or even a glimmer of cellulite.  If they push a size 8, they're morbidly obese.  Enough to make an almost 50 year old mom cry.

Nope.

There were skinny girls, athletic looking ones who could squat a small car, and some bikini model looking ones too.  But there were bigger girls who in judgy-er environs would feel self-conscious in a two piece suit, especially standing near the tinier ones.  But you know what?  They were wearing their swim suit, tanning, volleyballing, posing for their instagram stories, and having (from what I perceived) a ton of fun.   Happy, not hiding under a big t-shirt or in their apartment, but just enjoying the perfect college afternoon.

How great is that?  Didn't seem to be a cloud of body shaming or self-loathing hovering over anyone.  There were even guys there who looked like they were NOT spending the majority of their day in the gym agonizing over "macros ratios", whatever that is.... One guy had a large scar, either operative or trauma - I couldn't tell,  parallel to his entire spine, and he was no-shirting like all the rest.

They probably would think uh yeah, no big deal, old lady?!  We always are half-naked here - it's college!  I decided I would learn something equally if not more valuable than what I learned when I was studying for finals.  What we are is good.  Not just "good enough", because that implies an interval scale, where one lies between this and maybe better.  But good.  And we good people are meant to enjoy friends and sun and beer and the joy of the terminus of a college semester.

I am going to wear my bikini.  I do anyway, because I have to pee all the time, but now I am going to recall the girls I saw on a May afternoon and their confidence and joy and channel that.  I will endeavor to stop the comparison, and enjoy the sun and life I have.   Comparison is the thief of joy, according to Theodore Roosevelt, and I am not letting mine be stolen.

Happy Summer, friends!

My Royal Mom

May flowers bring me lots of memories.  I lost my mom 12 years ago today.  So many of us have lost our parents, and it's the way nature intended, them to leave before their children do.  It's still hard.  Every day that I think of her or recall a childhood memory, I wish I had her to phone and share.  After my Daddy died in 2014, I felt very alone for the first time ever, really.  An orphan, as someone heartlessly reminded me after his death.  My guiding stars were extinguished. 

May is Mother's Day, which doesn't make me sad to have lost mine because I have two children who make me who I am to them: Momma.  I don't put that on my facebook profile however, or list it first in my twitter bio, because as Mom always reminded me, I am way more than just that.  Being a mom is one of my most important roles, but it's not that simple.  We mothers have a zillion more facets than that.  I love thinking about my mom around Mother's Day.  I always plant lavender, because it was one of her favorites and it blooms around now.  Just a stroke of the blossoms with my hand evokes thoughts of my momma. 

May is also Royal Wedding month!  When your family is Canadian and subjects of the Queen, well, ya just adore a royal wedding.  When Wills and Kate got married (yes, we're that close we call them by their nicknames), Cameron and I got up at 0430 to have tea ready and watch the ceremony, just to install that memory into forever.  And we'll do it again 19th May this month for Harry and Meghan.  My beloved went to the UK for business last week and thoughtfully brought me a coffee mug celebrating the royal wedding, knowing both my mother and I would love it.  Momma had china representing all the weddings she lived through, refusing to retire the Charles and Diana (Chuck and Di to we familiar) plates even after Camilla entered the picture.  When Momma died, I couldn't keep it all (because minimalist), but I presented her precious heirlooms to her Daughters of the British Empire sisters who were thrilled to care for them. 

I hate that my children didn't know my mom as well as I wish they had.  But I tell them whenever the opportunity arises, "Nana would have said..." or "when I was a kid _____."  When we go to the family cabin in the summer every year, memories of my parents are in every whistle through the trees and every wave in the lake.   It is there, I can always see my guiding stars, bright in the northern sky. 

Happy Almost Mother's Day and Happy Wedding Harry & Meghan!