Everybodys Free To Wear Sunscreen
So I’m back after a brief unplanned break, 10 days to be precise which is the length of our Irish summer this year!! You see on the 31st of May a lot of Irish people were in a state of shock, disbelief and uncertainty as a bright yellow sphere appeared in the sky, the sun may be a normal natural thing for all of you in the rest of the world to experience but its a rare phenomenon here on the Emerald Isle.
Here in the homeland we have quit a different view on tanning than elsewhere on the globe. We call it getting a colour. You see apparently pale white is not a colour deemed attractive or even acceptable in our narcissistic society, ironic really considering our climate and humble heritage. So, fake tan sales and the use of sunbeds are thriving here even in the middle of winter. Don’t get me wrong i love a healthy sunkissed glow and it is true that when i venture on holiday to a location renowned for a more generous climate that i do like to return a less pale version of myself, however, given that i am of pale skin and live in Ireland where it rains 350 days of the year and the sun is in hibernation for just as many of those days i have come to accept what nature has given me. I believe that pale skin is just as healthy and beautiful as any other, i am also of the opinion that a deep tangoed tan on a cold rainy December day frankly just looks stupid! So it is on very rare occasions that i will succumb to the charms of fake tan. I have been lured in upon occasion and i know that a glow can be substantially more attractive than the walking corpse aesthetic my ghostly pale skin presents, how and ever i firmly believe that faking it is better than damaging your skin and i am obsessed with sunscreen.
On the road to obtaining a ‘colour’ in as little time as possible, because lets face it we don’t know if it will start raining next week or in the next hour, the irish tend to skip the sunscreen. Why i will never know. The majority of our population seem to think that we only need sunscreen when we are abroad, that the irish sun, being such a rare phenomenon has not got the power to burn us. We protect our children with spf 50+ but seem to think that the tough old Irish skin is tougher than the old Irish sun. Do we think we are super human? Is it possible that somewhere in the vast horizons of our mind that the appearance of the sun makes us loose all sense of, well, common sense? Or is it that we believe somewhere in the land of Larry the Leprachaun, The Children of Lir and Cuchulainn and Fionn Mac Cumhaill that we have special powers against the elements when on Irish soil and that our pale whitish blue skin cannot succumb the the damage caused by the suns ferocious UV rays.
Whatever the cause every year for our brief fleeting days of summer ninety percent of our population, these sun warriors, not worshippers, are defeated by there beloved enemy and turn from a dazzling whitish blue to an illuminating fierce red. Yes i’m talking about sunburn and lots of it!! The pain that these warriors suffer after their day of battle, yes just one day and more often than not the first day of sunshine, usually lasts longer than our short summer, yet they will forget their war wounds all too soon and by the time the sun returns for a few days next year they will be ready to go into battle once again with nothing but the bare skin on their backs.
Whatever the cause every year for our brief fleeting days of summer ninety percent of our population, these sun warriors, not worshippers, are defeated by there beloved enemy and turn from a dazzling whitish blue to an illuminating fierce red. Yes i’m talking about sunburn and lots of it!! The pain that these warriors suffer after their day of battle, yes just one day and more often than not the first day of sunshine, usually lasts longer than our short summer, yet they will forget their war wounds all too soon and by the time the sun returns for a few days next year they will be ready to go into battle once again with nothing but the bare skin on their backs.
For all of you sun warriors out their, no doubt now dealing with your battle wounds, I beg of you if you must be brown, fake it don’t bake it and please in the words of Baz Luhrmann ‘trust me on the sunscreen’.
