The Naked Gardener by L B Gschwandtner

Author:L B Gschwandtner
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: naked, Naked gardening, gardening, nudist, gardener
Publisher: MCWriting.com
Published: 2010-11-04T05:21:12.372000+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHT

THE PAINTED LADIES

I sometimes wonder why women’s bodies are not all the same. They have the same components but it’s as if a variety of parts was shipped to a body plant that lost the assembly instructions and stuck a long torso on short legs, large breasts on a small chest, a long neck on narrow shoulders and altogether ignored any sort of standardization. Not like tigers or robins or Luna moths, which are all interchangeably alike. Artists understand that women’s bodies are uniquely separate one from the other. Museums are crammed with images of women from Greek ideal to Cubist distortion. Lucille Clifton calls herself “a Cadillac of a woman” and mourns the end of her menstrual cycles. Mary Cassatt paints women caring for, cuddling, bathing, holding little children close. Picasso’s patterned Girl Before A Mirror, gazes at her reflection which is not wholly her, cut into a geometry that’s partly herself and partly a patchwork quilt of her own image. DeKooning’s tortured women, ghastly, grimacing, wildly painted, reflect the painter’s ambivalence, anger, fear of women. And what imagery would I bring back to the studio after this trip on the river?

We took off our night clothes and ran naked for the river. I had brought vegetable soaps and natural shampoo for washing. We used our bailing buckets as showers and tossed water at each other, soaped up, rinsed, and floated in the cool water. Even this early the sun was warm. It was going to be a hot day.

When we emerged, our nipples were taut and our skin tingly. A run for towels, a quick dry, we wrapped up like mummies and stood together by the river’s edge.

“Um, before you put on your clothes, I have something that might be fun for today’s leg of the trip.”

“The famed surprise,” said Charlene. “Wait, don’t tell me. It must be tequila. But so early in the morning? Oh I couldn’t. But if you force me … ”

“Actually I did bring a bottle of tequila along but that’s for tonight. For today I brought this.” I held up a canvas bag.

“Oh goody. A bag,” Charlene joked.

“Stop,” said Hope. “What’s in it?”

“I’ll show you.”

“Let’s put our clothes on first,” Erica said.

“No. Don’t get dressed. Look.”

I placed the bag on the ground and pulled the top open revealing many jars and brushes, lotions, and painting sponges on sticks.

“What’s all that?” Roz asked.

“Oh my God. It’s body paint. I once did a photo shoot in body paint. It was the coolest thing.” Valerie leaned over the bag and poked around inside it.

I handed out jars and brushes and showed them how to apply lotion first so the paint would come off easily later. After they did that, they wrapped their towels around their bodies again and stood waiting.

“I don’t know how to paint anything much less a body. Law school didn’t have an arts and crafts class,” Charlene said.

“Start by thinking about your body. About what’s going on with it. Maybe about what you like or don’t like about it.

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