As a former self-confessed sun worshipper, Olivia Stren faces the hard facts about what it means to be fully protected today.cartoon framed and hanging in my living room. In it, cat parents are talking to their feline son, who is smartly dressed, bow-tied and carrying a suitcase, presumably poised to leave his childhood home and set off into his adult life.
In my own family, much like the aforementioned cartoon cats, sun-seeking was a hobby, a pleasure and a sport. I fondly recall my parents, my sister and I tanning poolside on loungers in a happy lineup, passing the Hawaiian Tropic or the Bain de Soleil Orange Gelée like familial batons. In my family, “You look pale” landed like an insult, one degree away from, say, “You look tubercular.” “Pale” was pejorative.
So, yes, I now wear sunscreen with an SPF higher than 4, but—and this could be my greedy former tanned self talking—finding sun and basking in it remains one of life’s greatest pleasures for me. I can hardly think of anything more instantly mood- correcting. It’s physiological: Sunlight regulates our circadian rhythms and activates the production of feel-good neurotransmitters serotonin, dopamine and norepinephrine.
Yet today sun and shame travel in a conjoined orbit—there are few things that invite more shame, finger-wagging and regret than sunbathing. Sunning is the new smoking. I hear Carroll’s voice brighten at this comparison. “Yes! I always tell my patients that tanning is smoking for your skin.” “But what about vitamin D? And mood? What about joy?” I ask her weakly. She tells me to take supplements. There is an exchange from 1963 between Jackie Kennedy, who enjoyed spending summers at the Kennedys’ Cape Cod manse, and her New York City-based dermatologist, Erno Laszlo , that was documented in the doctor’s notes. They read: “She said she will stay out of the sun while at the Cape and always wear a hat.
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