Body Image, Spas and a New Game

Dear Friends,

Today I went to a Polish spa with my younger brothers and mother. My dad is coming back from a trip tomorrow, and it's been a long couple of weeks without him. So we needed to get out of the house so that my mom would survive the last day. This spa has been an old favourite of ours. We go there for a couple hours to enjoy the pool, mineral hot tubs and sauna.

My mother, Paul Hugh and I took turns spending 40 minutes in the pool with Isaac, my eight-year-old brother. When it was my turn I watched him practice underwater handstands. He held my glasses while I showed him how to do it. We went into a pool with waves and he held onto my neck, because he gets scared of water sometimes.

While we were there I started thinking about the way that people here think about bodies compared with the way they think about it in the States. People here in Poland and Czech are pretty comfortable with their bodies. At the spa there were a few young fit people who had great bodies, but most of them actually were middle aged or older or sometimes just lumpy. Most of the women wear two piece swimsuits regardless of their shape. People just don't care and the guys let their beer-bellies hang out.

When I first moved to Czech this was a shock to me. I was very uncomfortable in my class when we would change for gym. I was uncomfortable in the sauna when our class went to the local pool and had mandatory sauna time afterward. But gradually I think I have become way more comfortable with being around people who, frankly, aren't wearing a whole lot of clothing. Part of the reason I am comfortable with it, is the fact that nobody else cares one bit.

To be perfectly honest, there are times when I don't want to wear my swimsuit. Today I told my mom that I didn't want my bacne to show in my scoop-backed suit. She was like, "Don't worry about it. The sauna will do your skin good. And besides, no one cares."

Thanks, Mom.

Love,
Lucy Rose

PS
Here are some photos from today. I invented a new game. The game is called "Your Head is a Piece of Bread". This is an exciting game which we played with a strange and perfectly round piece of breasd. The rules are that you hold the object out and squint one eye to make it look like the person has a piece of bread for a head. this game is especially exciting, because, as Isaac discovered, you can do it with any object: a salt shaker, a lemon wedge, a cucumber...you get the picture.

PPS
Here is an old post about my favourite family vacation a few years ago. XOXO