Happy Little Trees

Wow. I think I’m scheduled to go on a cruise.

Last night, I started preparing by doing a self-tanner test. I tried a new creation from the self-tanner wonders at Loreal. This morning, I woke up and thought that maybe I had a skin disease or something, and then I remembered that I went to sleep right after my at-home spray tan. I sort of look like a white and tan tobiano.

Not being able to get a tan has affected my entire life. One summer, I went to the city-pool a lot with my friend, Holli. Holli was one of the kids that could argue on the playground that she had 1/16 Indian blood (we weren’t PC then). But the little girl with the last name “Whitehorse” always beat everybody out, because she had old black and white pictures of her granddad wearing a headdress. Anyway. Holli had a year-round tan that developed into a very dark brown through the summer. She played in the pool never worrying about things like sunscreen or sunburn.

Even as a child, I had a fear of staying in the sun for too long. It’s like I have an internal timer that puts panic inside of me if I’m outside with too little SPF. In as little as fifteen minutes, I’m cooked to a painful pink.

Why is it that most African-Americans want to be lighter and Caucasians want to be darker? Are we both trying to look more Hispanic? Is this J.Lo’s fault?