A Sleeveless Dress

I bought a pretty peach-colored sundress this spring and wore it for the first time this week. The dress made me think back to other clothes I have or have not worn for reasons that seem silly to me today.

Even playing in the back yard, I was wearing a dress

For example, when I was a girl my parents would not allow me or my sisters to go downtown in pants or shorts. It was fine to wear them around the house, but not into town. Dresses were required for walks to the store and for church, as well as for visits to my father's family. This edict stayed in place until I was a teenager, and by then my parents were both too busy and involved in other things to pay close attention to what we wore. Mom even started wearing shorts around the house and on picnics and camping trips, a big change for her.  Later she wore shorts and pants to town too.

I didn't mind the restriction on shorts too much because as a teen I was embarrassed by my white legs. I'm fair-skinned like my mother, and while my arms would take a nice tan (with plenty of freckling in the process!) my legs stayed stubbornly white. All the other girls had lovely tanned legs, or so it seemed, but mine were as white as two pieces of chalk. So I wore long pants all summer, at least when I went out in public. When we moved here to our land I worked outside so much that finally my legs tanned.

1986, and those arms were still small. Ah but change was on the way!

Then in my forties I noticed something else was happening: my upper arms got bigger and bigger. Yikes! Another trait inherited from my mother. Now I have always been happy to have her beautiful skin and the dark auburn hair tones and pretty legs were nice too. But her arms! I mean, was it fair that I also inherited my father's "thunder thighs"? I hardly think so, but there was no changing any of it.

1991 and my first time at the ocean. Long shorts and no sleeveless tops by then!
I thought I was fat too. Ah, to be that size again.

So I stopped wearing sleeveless dresses and tops because my arms made me self-conscious. I decided it was better to be hot than to expose those arms! I was back to wearing long pants too because after I went to work full-time there went that lovely summer tan.

Then the tide for tanning turned. People became aware of the danger of skin cancer and the accelerated aging and wrinkling caused by over-exposure to the sun. My pale complexion was suddenly not an issue. I began wearing walking shorts, capris and crops. Adventurous!

And then this sundress. It looked so cool, 100% cotton with a full skirt and no sleeves. I bought it, thinking maybe it would be a nice housedress. But when I pulled it on, I knew this dress and I were going to be good friends.

So finally, I am closing in on 70 years old, and I am once again wearing sleeveless dresses as I did so many years ago, and my white legs and big arms don't worry me any more. And I have to wonder why I let all these things bother me in the first place. We are all made as we are made, and unless we're rich enough to have plastic surgery we're stuck with what we've got for this lifetime anyway. We may be able to change a few things with diet and exercise, sure, but our basic self will not change.

I wonder if men have these same inhibitions about body image. Do men worry over their chicken legs or midriffs that suddenly begin to bulge in middle age? Or is this just a female thing? I look back at old photos of me when I thought I was too fat, and only wish I could ever be so thin again! But at that time, I dieted like crazy to stay in a size 8. I didn't like my freckles either. I don't think I'm alone in being so critical of my own appearance; most of us women give ourselves such a hard time and seldom stop to just appreciate who we are and how we are, or to find the beauty in our own selves. Until we're almost 70, and allow ourselves to wear a sleeveless sundress out in public.

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.