Better ways… Part 2

A couple of days ago I was writing about how a rainy day in Palm Springs had me thinking of warmer, sunnier days, which let me to reminisce about my first experience skinny dipping a few years ago.

Well the rains continued through the weekend and into today. The forecast is for more of the same tomorrow, and I’m still dreaming of sunshine and warm weather – and a soothing dip in the pool. So, I guess I should tell how one of those soothing dips in the pool resulted in shear panic.

My friend B was spending a lot of time out of town, but she gave me a key to her house and encouraged me to use her house and her pool. Which I did, gladly. But my first trip to her house when she was out of town was a little unsettling.

What if someone saw me entering the house and called the police? How could I demonstrate that I had permission to be there? It’s not like she left me a letter or anything. Or what if I screwed up something with the heater to the hot tub? A smattering of those paranoid thought rambled through my brain.

I was uncomfortable the whole time I was in her backyard, so I cut my planned stay short.

But I soon relaxed and got into the spirit. Before long I was packing up a cooler of cerveza, taking along some tunes, and having a fantastic time. I took along swimming trunks as well, but found I was wearing them less and less when by the pool. It still felt funny to walk around naked, but I would take the trunks off before hitting the water, then put them on again when I got out.

On one such visit I even called my friend who had told me about the joys of skinny dipping just to boast about how I had this beautiful pool all to myself. Unfortunately, she was a little too far away to pop over and share it with me.

Yes, I’d grown quite comfortable there, and was lamenting the fact that B would probably be moving out of town. There would go my pool access. So I resolved to take maximum advantage while I could.

On one sunny Sunday afternoon, I took my supplies and headed over to B’s house. I left my trunks and towel on a lounge chair and swam to the point of light fatigue. Then I lounged on this inflatable chair B had by the pool. Just drifting on the water, letting the wind blow me around the pool. Occasionally, I would dip a hand into the cool water and dribble it over my bare skin to cool me off. And if I got too hot, I would just slide into the water to cool down.

B had one of those automatic pool cleaners, and it did an amazing job keeping the pool clean. But the pool filter only kicked on at night. And Palm Springs has a fair amount of wind. So leaves and other debris were floating around in the pool. I decided that with free pool access, the least I could do was clear out some of the gunk in the pool. So I paraded around the deck, naked, except for sandals to protect my feet from the blistering-hot tiles and cement.

I must have made quite a site. The naked pool boy, with a long-handled net, removing leaves from the pool. But it felt good. It felt like I was earning my keep. Maybe nudists are onto something.

I walked over to the hot tub to clean some of the leaves out of there too. But the long-handled net didn’t work to remove the leaves and twigs that had collected in there.

This was going to take some good, old fashioned elbow grease. So, I put my net down and climbed into the hot tub. I was pulling out leaves and twigs, giddy with own thoughtfulness and initiative.

Just then some movement caught my eye and I froze.

Through the patio door I could see somebody entering the front door of the house. I didn’t think B was supposed to be home that day. I hope she doesn’t mind I’m back here. But she will know I’m here. My truck’s right out front. It might be a tad embarrassing to be nude in her pool, but she had seen me nude before. I’d live.

But then I saw the silhouettes of three people coming through the open front door.

That’s not B.

Oh shit.

Then it dawned on me.

This house is on the market. I’d seen the little key box real estate agents use outside the front door several times. What the hell is a real estate agent doing working on a Sunday? What happened to the day of rest?

My mind started racing.

It was difficult to make out any coherent thoughts. My body was immobile, like the water in the hot tub had suddenly turned to cement. But my mind was spinning so fast that there was a perceptible buzz inside my head.

You can’t just stay here stupid!

Well, you can’t get out either, the patio door looks right out onto the pool.

My heart was pounding in my chest. I willed myself to figure something out before terror overcame me. But panic was lapping will and pulling away.

Then, slowly an elaborate plan started to come together.

When they are back in one of the back rooms, I will slip over the wall of the hot tub and into the pool, swim to the other side. Lift myself out. Grab my trunks and slip them on.

But there were problems with that plan. Could I do it fast enough? Could I do it quietly enough in trying to be quick?

The sun’s glare off the patio door made it hard to tell what was going on inside the house. I could never really be sure where the interlopers where, and they didn’t seem to be sticking together.

The gate to the backyard was a short sprint away, but running out into the front yard wouldn’t help. It would make a bad situation worse. Then I’d be even more out in the open. More exposed.

And I knew, sooner or later, they would come out back. You don’t show a house with a pool without looking at the pool, right? Maybe the aspiring owners would hate the place so much they wouldn’t bother with the back yard and its pool and hot tub, and the stunning view of the mountains.

If only I'd turned on the pump to the hot tub. Maybe the bubbles would obscure my nudity. Can I make it to the pump switch and back to the tub?

And then it was too late.

The patio door slid open

“Hi there,” the male aspiring homeowner said.

Shit.

“Hi,” was my feeble reply.

Shit, fuck, Shit!

The rest of the conversation is a bit of a blur. The man walked out onto the patio. He started asking me about the house.

I confessed it wasn’t my house, but a friend’s.

“Oh,” said.

Not knowing what else to do, I made another confession.

“Can I ask you a favor?” I pleaded with every bit of sincerity in my being, my voice and body trembling.

“Can I trouble you to bring me those swim trunks over there? I didn’t know anyone was coming by, and this back yard is so private, and …” my voice trailed off. Not quite sure how to explain why I was NEKKED in the back yard of the house this man was considering purchasing.

The man laughed, which relaxed me a little, but not much.

“Sure,” he said.

I pointed feebly to the swimming suit and towel about 10 feet away from him.

I hugged the inside wall of the hot tub as this stranger approached, my swim trunks in his hand.

Hopefully, he’s a prudish homicidal maniac and will just kill me now.

No such luck.

But he did hand me my trunks and walked back into the house.

I slipped the trunks into the water and over my legs.

The people in the house left shortly thereafter.

After my heartbeat returned to something approaching normal, I left as well.

That pretty much ended my skinny dipping that summer.

The couple that caught me bare assed in the hot tub? They didn’t make an offer on the house.

Too bad they didn’t see the mountain view from the hot tub. It was spectacular. That may have sold ’em on the place.

Palm Springs
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There are better ways to get wet

Do you believe in global warming? Well, if the world is getting hotter, you wouldn’t know it here in Palm Springs.

It was cold and rainy here Friday. Foggy even. Fog in the Coachella Valley. I’ve never seen that before. Fog. In Palm Springs. Never happens.

My little weather monitor tells me it is 50 degrees outside right now, which equals the warmest it was all day. We got more than a half an inch of rain today, which may not sound like much, but for a place that only gets about 5 inches a year, it’s phenomenal. And when it rains in the desert, there is flooding – without fail.

And the forecast is for more of the same until about Tuesday.

If I’d have wanted this shit, I could have stayed in Portland.

I find myself thinking of sunshine and warmer days. How I long for a hot days (and nights) and a refreshing dip in a pool, rather than sitting around in sweats, a wool shirt and curled up under an afghan – alone.

We have a couple of pools in the apartment complex I call home. But my thin skin gave up on swimming a couple of months ago. I’m not even sure if the pools here are heated. But even if they are, and it would be warm enough to swim, you still have to get out into the cold air.

No thanks.

I’m a wimp.

I admit it.

I’ll wait for spring, thank you very much. I may venture into the hot tub. But the pool? Maybe once the water temperature reaches, say, 88.

I never used the pool too much at my old apartment complex. I’m too self conscious. Poor body image, and all that.

But a few years ago, a friend who owned a house here in Palm Springs, complete with pool and hot tub, invited me over for a small gathering. I guess I must have made my pool envy a little too obvious. But my friend, who we’ll call “B” invited me back for another visit and said I could use the pool. So, on my next visit, I brought my trunks. After dinner and some drinks, we took advantage of the warm, late summer night and took to the pool.

B was having a bit of a rough time professionally during that period, so we spent a lot of time talking. We spent a lot of time drinking wine too. Wine just tastes colder and sweeter when you are sitting in a hot tub for some reason. Not sure why, but I didn’t analyze it too much, I just enjoyed it.

It was so peaceful sitting there, under a star-filled desert sky, sipping chardonnay, soaking in steaming hot water and staring up at the stars. It seemed like heaven on earth. All the troubles of my workday seemed to melt away on those hot summer nights.

“Now this is why people love Palm Springs,” I said to B.

In Palm Springs and the rest of the Coachella Valley, the back yard is a personal spa for many, and an extension of the house. The backyard becomes the de facto family room, or party room. And the outdoor environment is why people come here, which is what make this rain such a bitch.

So, when I visited B’s house I took my trunks along, just hoping above hope that there would be an invitation to take advantage of the pool and hot tub. But B, I soon learned, didn’t own a bathing suit. It seems she didn’t normally wear one. And why should she? She had her own house with her own pool and a nice fence to keep out prying eyes.

In deference to having a guest, and a modest one at that, B improvised a bathing suit. Of course cotton panties and a cotton T-shirt don’t leave much to the imagination when wet, but who was I to complain? I had wine. I had access to a pool. I had access to a hot tub. I was with a woman in a wet T-shirt and underwear.

And it was her damn house, she could do whatever the hell she wanted as far as I was concerned.

And she did.

It didn’t take long for B to get tired of swimming in a wet T-shirt. It may have been our second swim party, or maybe even late in the first one. I was sitting in the hot tub and B was in the pool, just swimming around. She came up for air and was wrestling with the wet shirt, all twisted around and sticking to her skin. With a grumble she said “Fuck it” and threw modesty, and her T-shirt, out of the pool and onto the deck, where it landed with a thunderous splat.

“I hope you don’t mind, but that thing was driving me nuts,” she said.

“No problem,” I said. “It’s your house. Your pool.”

“I know,” she said. “I just don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“I think I’ll be fine” I said. She was the one virtually naked. Of course I was traumatized enough taking my shirt off in front of a woman, but seeing a topless woman didn’t frazzle my nerves.

Actually I was impressed that B was not at all self conscious. Or at least she seemed to be. But that was her way. She was older than me and, well, she was heavy. But that wasn’t her most distinguishing characteristic. But she was bold, boisterous, verging on wild. It was an image she cultivated and manufactured for herself. I admired it and her for being so, so, out there. I wished I were more like that. She was unashamed and she seemed comfortable in her skin, something I have rarely been.

After that, B didn’t bother with the T-shirt. And pretty soon, she didn’t bother with the panties either.

I confessed to B that I have never been skinny dipping, to which B gave me a stunned look. It was true, I hadn’t. Never really had the opportunity. It never came up before. Well, B told me there was nothing like it. She went on and on. I had another friend who had a pool when she was growing up in Arizona who had told me the same thing.

But could it really be all that? I decided there was only one way to find out. After all, when in my life, as an apartment dweller, might I get the chance to try it again?

So, I chucked the trunks. And I found it really was all that. And more.

I won’t even bother to describe the feeling. If you haven’t been skinny dipping, you should try it. And if you have, you know.

It’s like sex. How do you describe sex to someone who hasn’t done it? Swimming with a bathing suit on is like masturbation. It feels good, no question. But it can’t adequately prepare you for the feeling of going all the way.

So, in my mid 30s, I skinny dipped for the first time.

I spent a lot of time naked in that pool that summer and fall. Summer 2001. Before the world changed. Sometimes I was with B, sometimes alone. B was between jobs, so she spent some of her time looking for work, and some of it traveling to visit family and friends. But she told me I could use the house and the pool anytime, and I took advantage of the offer.

It was a magic summer and early fall.

It would lead to the most embarrassing moment of my life.

But that’s a story for another post.

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