Poolside phobia

It's been quite a while since I allowed the sun to have direct access to my bare chest, outside of the privacy of a fenced backyard.

How long, you might ask? There's a photo of taken circa 1989 that shows me on a beach in Cape Cod. There's little 7-year-old Matt, holding a little pail and a shovel, smiling goofily while wearing a red bathing suit.

And that picture represents the last time I ever let anyone take a photo of me with my shirt off. Hell, come to think of it, that photo might be the last time I've been shirtless in public. Maybe not, but it's been about 15 years since I felt remotely comfortable removing my shirt in front of the prying eyes of strangers, especially girls.

I hate my torso. I have since 9th grade gym class, when I overheard a nasty comment made by a classmate in the locker room. From that day forward, I was the kid who changed for gym class by sneaking into the bathroom stall. I didn't even like bearing my upper arms. In fact, I've had college roommates who have never seen me barechested. I really am that modest.

The worst days of all were gym classes in the swimming pool. Middletown High had a nice Olympic sized pool, a venue where many of my friends have swum for the team and had absolutely no qualms about strutting around in Speedos. To me, however, that pool represented the greatest of my phobias... a place where I would be required to shed my shirt and allow classmates (boys and girls) to see me in my most shameful state.

There were three strategies to employ to overcome this phobia....

1. Change really quickly into the bathing suit and jump into the pool before any of the girls had left their own locker room (worked once or twice before disaster).

2. Wear a shirt into the water and look like the typical fat kid afraid to take off his shirt (hide the skin? Yup, but quite immasculating).

3. Tell Mom that the chlorine in the pool irritated my skin, resulting in a note to the gym teacher (fantastic success rate, but total bull).

Hot summer days were especially tough. By high school, I was not only ashamed of my body's appearance, but also of the way I sweated. As a result, my typical summer wardrobe was a black t-shirt, even on the beach or poolside. Yeah, the black hid the sweat, but oy, the heat and the idiocy of being "that guy."

The farmer's tan, however, was always spectacular.

Swimming pools were so tempting, yet so scary. They offered friends, girls, and chicken fights involving those girls and your friends. Shirts, however, weren't exactly recommended attire. My solution to this problem was to either watch pathetically from the side, or to sit on the edge of the pool with my feet dipped into water, pretending that I didn't want someone to push me in fully clothed.

So now, let's fastforward to the present. I still have some work to do on my body before I feel exactly "beach ready," but the clock is ticking. Why? Well, the honeymoon has been booked, and Megan and I are headed on a Caribbean cruise. It's something I've wanted to do for years. The last time I cruised, it was the Disney variety and I was in 5th grade. I still remember the private island in the Bahamas when I was standing in a lagoon. A large fish swam by my leg. Curious, I turned to my father...

"Dad, what was that?"

"Uh, that was a barricuda."

"... I'm getting out of the water now."

Despite the incident, I've been eager to go again. This time, I'll be a bit older and on my honeymoon (though I still would be happy to see Donald Duck on board). I'll be married, so there won't be any pressure to impress anyone at poolside.

But will the shades of embarassment still be there? Will I still shy away from the sun and hide my torso safely behind a t-shirt and out of view of the fellow cruisers?

Nope.

Look out, Princess Cruises. I'm much lighter, sweating far less than I did in high school, and hopefully by the time we embark, I'll be as cut as I've ever been in my life. And, when I get to the pool, the t-shirt is landing on the deck.


P.S. I have no intention of counting points while on the cruise liner. Diet be damned, I'm laying waste to that buffet...