Bring a Bathing Suit

This is a long story about something quite simple:

I grew up along the Thompson river in Kamloops, BC. We owned a boat; and summers were spent covered in nothing, but sunscreen and a bathing suit. I loved my bathing suits and I remember them well. When I was little, I had a fabulous black, one-piece with daisies and frills. When I was a young girl, I begged my mom for a two piece. When she finally caved, you better believe it was the brightest, pinkest bikini you had ever seen. When I was a teen, I owned just about every combination of coloured top and bottom you could imagine. I loved those suits, and in the summer you couldn’t get me out of them. This was all sometime between birth and 2012.

Bring a bathing suit.

As a young adult, I have a bathing suit… somewhere. I don’t actually know where it is, and I am not looking for it. I don’t know when I bought it, and it doesn’t matter. I don’t know if the top matches the bottom, and I don’t mind. I don’t know if it still fits, and I really don’t care to know. This was all sometime between 2014 and Tuesday June 28th, 2016.

Bring a bathing suit.

I have a bodybuilding posing suit. It’s deep purple with Swarovski crystals all over it. The suit is still slightly stained from my spray tan. It sits in a glass yellow box with “you are my sunshine” etched into the top of it. It’s folded nicely and sits beside two numbered buttons and a pile of glamorous jewellery. The box sits on a white shelf to the left of my bed, to the right of my brown travel journal. I know exactly where that suit is.

Bring a bathing suit.

The last bathing suit I bought for myself was from my time in Laos in 2011. I bought it because I was in need of a bigger size having just exited Vietnam (MAN – their food is goooood). For $7 I bought a brown polka-dot bikini that was two sizes larger than the faded blue one I arrived in the country with. That was the first bikini I ever hated. That suit was the first thing out of my bag and into the bin when I got back to Canada. Once home, I committed myself to some pretty serious fitness goals. After tossing that wretched bikini, the last time I had a bathing suit on was late April 2015: 4 weeks before my second bodybuilding show. It was a black two piece that I had borrowed from a much smaller friend. The cut was for that of a child and the tags read “XS” bottom, and “S” top. Both were baggy - I wore it anyway. I was proud. I walked like I was proud.

Bring a bathing suit.

"Kelly, please don't feel obligated to tell me, but are you well?" I was at the pool and I had run into a doctor friend I hadn’t seen in a while. I made a face. Am I well? What? He quickly back tracked and said, "I mean, I haven't seen you in a while… You're just really… ill… that's all." I laughed. Ohhh. He didn't know I was doing a bodybuilding show. I told him. He understood and said he was glad I wasn't sick. After we said goodbye, I did some laps and went to the sauna. While in the sauna I reflected on our talk. I felt complimented. I felt like I had done what I set out to do: I was thin, finally! It wasn't until I left the sauna that I totally understood what he meant. I ran into my close friend's daughters, both under the age of ten. They stared at me – I scared them. They didn't understand. I felt like I had to explain. I remember saying to them, "This is temporary. I won't look like this forever." It was in that moment that I realised what I looked like. I was a nearly stage ready girl in a regular bikini. My body in a posing suit, to people at a bodybuilding show, made sense. My body in a bikini, to people at the pool, looked "unwell", or rather – “ill”. Two thoughts passed through my head. One: This is the first time since I was too young to care that I have felt confident in my own skin. And two: This is the first time since I was too young to care that I have felt confident in my own skin and I look sick. This was the last time I ever wore a bikini. The last time I wore a posing suit was 4 weeks later in May 2015. Since then, I have not worn either… like I said, IF I own a bikini, I don’t know where it is and I like it that way.

Bring a bathing suit.

“Hey! Want to come up to my parents place for a drink and swim tomorrow around 9?” Hurrah! I have been invited to hang out with the one and only Muscle Momma, her hubby: Daddy Karlos, and the guy who introduced those two love birds, Jay. I know MM from doing shows, I know of DK through this blog, and I met Jay where I work. These are all people I half know, but would love to know better. You can imagine I was really excited to receive MM’s invite. The only hiccup? Swim. The following text? Bring a bathing suit.

Bring a bathing suit.

I let it sink in. A bathing suit. I have done everything in my power to not have a need to wear one for the past however many years. I avoided situations. Ignored invites. Falsified other plans. I don’t own one. Or maybe I do? I don’t care. I don’t want one. I can’t be in one. Panic. I really want to go. I don’t want to go. I said I was going and then looked for an excuse get out of it. Maybe I just won’t swim? Maybe I’ll get a spray tan and say I am waiting for it to develop? Maybe I’ll catch the bubonic plague, fall deathly ill and simply won’t attend. Panic. Relax. It’s just a bathing suit. But, is it just a bathing suit? For me, bathing suits are the material version of every insecurity I have ever had. Every suit represents a feeling. Black and white daisies? Carefree. Hot pink bikini? Thriving. Mix and match? Freedom. Faded blue? Living. Brown polka dots? Hate. Black borrowed? Obsessed. Purple and sparkly? Dangerously obsessed. There are reasons why I haven’t owned one for a while.

Just buy a stupid bathing suit.

In my mind, it was all or nothing. I couldn’t accept the invite if I didn’t have a suit. In hindsight, I know that’s wasn’t the case. But we have all been there, I am sure. “I am really nervous to try these on” was what I texted to my close girlfriend, Kim, from inside the change room. Kim and I have been friends for years. She is one of few people whom I have disclosed all of my body hang ups to. She has pep-talked me into cute tops and out of pancake butt jeans. Naturally, she is my go-to while locked in a 4x4 box with unflattering overhead fluorescent lighting doing something that I have no desire to do. “What do you think of this one? Ignore my underwear. I know the lighting is terrible but…” is the next text I sent out. I waited. She blew up my phone – apparently I needed all of them… Specifically the burgundy bandeau bathing suit. Here’s the really grainy, “every girl has been here”, underwear still on, untouched photo from that experience. At this point I want to clarify – I do not think I am fat. I am just learning to love myself at my pace. The last time I was in a bikini it was hanging off me, now the medium bottoms are too tight. This is not a bad thing, but it does play with the mind a little.

Bring a bathing suit.

A while ago I told myself I would be more of a “yes” person. So, here I am, yessing: “On my way! Are you sure you don’t need anything?” It is a miracle that I have not caught the plague, I have not gone for an impromptu a spray tan, and I have actually packed my new burgundy bandeau bathing suit. Know that all those things are something I would actively try to do and for the first time in years – I actually own, and actually plan to wear a bikini.

But – after all that… something really funny happened: I didn’t even put it on. Not because I felt that I was going to be uncomfortable, but because it never even came up. As it turns out, the company was so great that we didn’t need an activity to have a good time. Over a few glasses of wine I got to know three really cool – and really funny – people. Muscle Momma has some big dreams and some really great “later plans” up her sleeve. Daddy Karlos builds with ROBOTS and has some serious Bear Grylls Skills. Jay is responsible for the marriage of Muscle Momma and Daddy Karlos and he is gonna make the world’s longest noodle (Hey Jay – the challenge has been thrown down). These are three great people that I would have missed out on meeting, or knowing better, had I have come down with the fictitious bubonic plague.

Wear your bathing suit.

To quote my favorite poet Anis Mojgani,

“Grab this world by its clothespins and shake it out again and again and jump on top and take it for a spin and when you hop off - shake it again. For this is yours… this is yours. Make my words worth it. Make this not just some poem that I write, not just some poem like just another night that sits heavy above us all. Walk into it, breathe it in, let it crash through the halls of your arms like the millions of years of millions poets coursing like blood, pumping and pushing, making you live, shaking the dust. So when the world knocks at your front door, clutch the knob tightly and open on up and run forward and far into its widespread greeting arms with your hands outstretched before you… fingertips trembling, though they may be.”

If poems aren’t your jam, what I take from Anis is: Wear your bathing suit. Not necessarily your literal bathing suit, but your figurative ugly brown polka dot one. Your bathing suit might be something like baring your stretch marks, scars, or extra skin. Your bathing suit might be something like wearing less makeup, showing off your birthmark, or letting your ears poke out. Like me, your bathing suit may be something so literal, it might be an actual bathing suit. Whatever it may be, wear it. Wear it because when you stop worrying about your “bathing suit”, you ease up on yourself enough to be open to some seriously awesome life-stuff. The same life-stuff you can hold yourself back from enjoying.

Bring your bathing suit – everywhere.

When Muscle Momma asked me to write something for her blog, I was flattered. As a reader myself, I was nervous about what to write. MM does such a great job of saying just enough without saying too much. I hope I haven’t said too much. If you have skimmed this and just want to pull some of me from this then here you go:

My cheeks are still a little sore from laughing. I made one brand new friend (Daddy Karlos), I got to know a really great guy outside of our usual hang out spots (Jay) and got to talk to MM – not just type to her. I got to hear all about the adventures of Moose and Boo and, even though I was the new friend, never once did I feel like the new friend. I almost missed out on a really fantastic time, with real quality people over a “bathing suit”. The lesson? Bring your “bathing suit” - everywhere.

All my love and a slice of pie,

K.