Day 1

When my mom woke me up that Saturday morning, I had no idea that my life was about to go from “Same stuff different day, with its high points” to “Unending living hell”.

Look, I can already tell what you’re thinking. It’s like you’re in a comic book and you have a thought bubble over your head. “This Emma girl is crazy”, is what it says. “She’s just a high school girl, clearly she’s exaggerating.”

I get where you’re coming from, I do. And in all fairness, you’re not that wrong. If this was the week prior and my mom had bought me a new purse and thrown my old one out, I probably would have said the same thing, but on that Saturday everything was put into perspective for me.

I was sitting in the back seat of the car, my dad was driving, my mom was riding shotgun when I remembered that my mom didn’t just drag me out of bed telling me we were going to the beach today, she dragged me out of bed telling me that we were going to the beach today and that she and my dad would have a surprise for me when we got there.

“Hey mom,” I piped up over the radio. “What was that you were saying earlier about a surprise at the beach?” I was cautiously excited. My parents usually mean well but seem a little bit disconnected from what makes a teenage girl happy, so it could be anything from them planning to rent a jet ski for a few hours (awesome!) to my dad wanting me to fish with him (lame!).

Almost in sync with each other, my mom and dad both turned towards each other (keep your eyes on the road, dad!) and something seemed to pass between them. My dad turned his head forward again and said “We may as well tell her now. There’s no sense keeping it a secret any longer.”

“Well,” my mom said, “we aren’t going to the beach we usually go to. We’re going to one that’s a little further away”.

“Oh. That’s weird. And not really a surprise. Why are we going to a different beach?”

The next string of words exploded out of my mom’s mouth at such a speed I almost didn’t understand them. “We’re going to a nude beach today and your father and I have been talking and we intend to have our family life as nudists from now on because we think it would be healthy for us as a family and for you as a grown woman!”

“Whoa, calm down, Deb,” said my dad. “We talked about this and you have nothing to be nervous about, remember?”

“Oh, Jack, I know,” my mom replied.

“Wait for a second,” I said, sounding surprisingly calm. I should have been terrified, but at that point, I was mostly confused. “You guys want to be nudists? Like, people who are naked all the time?”

My mom started to say something, but my dad put up a hand to silence her.

“Well, sweetheart, yes, but I don’t think you’re fully understanding us. We’re going to a nude beach and, starting today, your mother and I expect our entire family to engage in the nudist lifestyle. And yes, that includes you.”

At first, I laughed, thinking it was some kind of a joke. Then I started screaming until my dad gave me one of those looks. You know, the kind of look that lets a kid know she should either start behaving differently or something awful would happen, so I shut up and just cried quietly for the rest of the ride.

We got to the beach parking lot and unloaded the trunk of the car. A chair for each of us, a cooler, towels, sunscreen, and everything else a family might need for a long, humiliating day at the beach. I took what I was handed without a word.

My parents had been chit-chatting nonsense the whole time as if they weren’t actively trying to ruin their only child’s life, but as we started walking towards the sand-dunes obscuring our view of the shore my dad finally addressed me.

“You know, Emma, it’s not going to be that bad.”

“What are you talking about, dad. This is going to be a nightmare. Literally, I mean, isn’t being naked in a public place nightmare 101?”

“Well, yes and no. Tell me, would you be embarrassed to wear a bathing suit to the mall?”

“Is that a joke? Of course, I would be.”

“But you wouldn’t be embarrassed to wear one to the beach, right?”

“Of course not. It’s the beach that’s what you’re supposed to wear when you- oh, I see what you’re doing.” I looked at my dad and he had a stupid grin on his face.

“So does that make you feel a little better? You don’t have to be embarrassed to wear nothing at this beach because being naked is normal here”.

I can’t lie, it did make me feel a little bit better. Nowhere near as much as the words “Actually, beloved daughter of mine, let’s go to a normal beach like a normal family and wear bathing suits like normal people!”, so I was still miserable, only a little less so. I couldn’t let my dad know that, though, so I simply said “No” and stayed silent, but from his smile, I think he knew his words had had an effect.

We got to the sand dune and there were wooden stairs that led up to a boardwalk that went over it. At the base of the stairs, there was a sign that said “Beyond this point, you may encounter nude sunbathers”. My parents gave each other stupid-looking smiles and we kept walking.

Eventually, we got near the end of the boardwalk, and we were rapidly approaching the point where I’d be able to look at the beach and see a bunch of naked people. The whole time I’d been too worked up over having to be naked that I forgot about the other half of the situation; that I was about to see a bunch of people naked. Would there be naked men there? Naked boys my age? Naked girls my age? I was still a virgin, and the sudden realization of the situation I was about to be in, sent a tingle between my legs. It was almost enough to make me forget the dread I was feeling at having a bunch of strangers, not to mention my own parents, see me in the naked.

We were almost at the point where we’d be past the sand dune and I’d be able to see the beach, and more importantly, the people on the beach. My heart was hammering in my chest. I unconsciously started walking faster than my parents. I was almost there. A few short steps away and I’d be able to see, nothing. Well, not nothing, but nothing out of the ordinary. With a stab of disappointment, I looked down over the beach and saw a bunch of normal families, normal men, normal women, normal kids, and normal teenagers enjoying the beach wearing normal bathing suits. After looking for a minute I did realize that there were some people naked. Here and there, maybe one naked person for every ten in a bathing suit, and among them maybe 4 naked men for every naked woman, and not one of them was under forty.

“Huh,” I heard my dad say from behind me. “It’s not exactly what I was expecting.”

“Well it is clothing optional, not nudity mandatory,” said my mom.

“Oh well, we can still make the best of it. Come on everyone, let’s go.”

We walked down to the beach and my dad picked out a spot for us to set up our stuff. The beach was really crowded and it was difficult to find an area to sit in. To our right was a pretty decent-sized, clothed family who seemed to be trying to organize lunch with countless kids under ten and a few teenagers of both genders. To our left was a nude couple in their forties with dark, tanned skin laying in the sun. I tried not to stare at him, but it wasn’t easy. Right there, on display, was his penis. This was the first time I’d ever seen one that wasn’t on a boy still in diapers, and there he was, just letting the world see it all. I would never have called him attractive if I had seen him walking down the street, but seeing a naked man close up for the first time made me feel ... weird. I’m no stranger to my own body, and I felt myself start to moisten up between my legs, which only made me more nervous until I realized-

“Hey, dad!” I spat out, feeling true hope. “What you were saying before, about us getting naked here because it’s normal? That doesn’t apply anymore, right? I mean, look around, everyone is clothed. So I guess I can keep my bathing suit on, right?”

I had a big, triumphant smile on my face, but my dad just looked at me and shook his head.

“Nice try, Emma. This is a nude beach, there are other nude people here, and you’re about to be one of them.”

“You should really be more appreciative, young lady,” my mother added. “I’ve been spending a lot of time on the internet doing research, and apparently children who grow up as nudists have much healthier self-image and views on sexuality.”

I would later find out that literally, everything on the internet about introducing your kid to the nudist lifestyle says that you need to make sure you let your kid make the choice, but I didn’t know that at the time. Not that it would have made a difference in my parents’ minds. They know best, after all.

So rather than coming back with a witty retort, I just stood there in stunned silence.

“Here’s how it’s going to go, Emma,” my dad said, sounding almost scarily stern. “Your mother and I are going to set up the beach blanket, the umbrella, and the chairs, and then we’re going to take off our clothes. We’re going to take our sweet time with it, and if you aren’t nude by the time we are, there’s going to be trouble. Do you understand?”

My heart was pounding almost too hard to hear him. I tried to say something but my throat wouldn’t work, so I just nodded and faced away from him. How long did I have? Two minutes? Ten? Oh god, was this really happening? Me, naked? My dad, seeing me naked? I looked back at the family that was eating lunch next to us. There were plenty of men and boys there, and the thought of any male seeing me naked for the first time was mortifying, but there were three I couldn’t help but focus on. Three teenage boys, right around my age. If I had to guess I’d say two of them were 14 or 15, and the third looked a bit older, probably in 12th grade. And there I was, about to be naked in front of boys who could have gone to school with me.

I took a deep breath and tried to relax, but I couldn’t. I was still facing away from my parents, but I knew it couldn’t be long before they had our stuff ready and they took off their clothes. I had my bathing suit on under my clothes (silly me, thinking I’d need a bathing suit at the beach!), so I had no issue kicking off my skirt and taking off my tank top.

I tried to work up the courage to keep undressing as I stood there in my blue one-piece. Yes, I was wearing a one-piece. Before that day I wouldn’t have even been comfortable showing off my belly at the beach. It wasn’t that long ago that puberty started and I still wasn’t used to having breasts or a butt that curved out, and even when swimming I liked to stay covered up.

I looked back at my parents and saw them sticking the umbrella into the sand. The chairs were unfolded, and the blanket was laid out. I didn’t have much time before they started taking off their clothes. I couldn’t stand to look at them while I stripped, so I turned back towards the ocean.

I put my hands on the straps of my bathing suit, but they wouldn’t listen to me. I wasn’t like other girls my age. I was never rebellious or disobedient to my parents. If they told me to do something, I did it. So while another girl might have told their parents to suck it, thinking to disobey my parents (or specifically, my daddy) just didn’t come naturally to me. So I was as shocked as either of my parents when, instead of taking off my bathing suit, I made a mad dash for the ocean.

My dad called out after me but I kept running and he didn’t follow. I hit the water and didn’t stop until it was up to my chest and the waves were breaking between me and the shore.