Permission to look terrible in shorts

Until today, I haven’t worn shorts in public for over 30 years. Aside from gym shorts worn on the treadmill I have at home, I haven’t worn them in private either. At some point in my early teens, I decided that I had “weird” knees, that I should not wear shorts and that was that. 

This week, I don’t know if it was the extreme heat or an awareness of all the other very serious challenges I’ve got at the moment, but I questioned that assumption. I wanted to walk around in the same unselfconscious way I did as a child, before I became properly aware of body image; I wanted to feel the sun on my skin; I wanted to be like the people I see of all shapes and sizes in shorts, comfortable in the heat. 

If was driven entirely by my heart, I would have bought a pair of shorts yesterday, but I’m not – if my brain doesn’t agree with my heart, then generally my brain will win. I thought about how other people wear shorts and I don’t judge them at all. I thought about how arrogant it was of me to think that anyone would really care. I thought about how I’ve come to terms with gaining weight in the last few years… Don’t get me wrong, I am aware of why I gained the weight, and I’m aware that I need to address it for my health, but I’m kind to myself about where I am and I know I’ve got more pressing issues to address before I get to it. I thought about how, even before I gained weight, clothes for me have always been about camouflage – hiding what I perceive as the worst bits of me. Even in more recent years when, following the very excellent example of my sister who dresses every day like she’s off to a wonderful, colourful party, I chose clothes that made me happy, I still did so within those parameters of camouflage. So, a bright t-shirt with Lloyd Dobler holding up his stereo was fine, even if it’s not stylish or cool, but shorts were not. I thought, too, about summers when I was a child and I shot up in height - a pair of jeans would be made into cut-offs and I’d feel happy I got to keep them a bit longer. Then I spent a long time on the internet looking at shorts. By the time I was heading for bed, I thought I’d spent way too much time thinking about wearing shorts and I was just being stupid. 

This morning, I woke up early to glorious sunshine and the same wish was still there. I made a deal with my brain – I’d go for my early walk in gym shorts, see how that felt and then I’d decide what to do. You already know what happened on my walk this morning… nothing. No one ran away in horror at my weird knees, no one said anything other than a polite and cheery “good morning,” and the sky didn’t fall in just because my legs were on display. What I felt, however, was the sun on my skin, the freedom of feeling comfortable and years of unnecessary worry about my size, my shape, my body all falling away. Honestly, I know I’ve got bigger fish to fry right now.

When I got back from having my breakfast by the sea, I took myself to the shops and bought some denim shorts. This is not a story about how I looked in the mirror and realised all along that I looked beautiful. This is not a story about how I had the courage to wrestle with my body image and wear shorts again. This is a story about what a fucking idiot I’ve been for 30 years, because it’s not about beauty or even about courage. It’s just about the fact that when it’s sunny, shorts are the best thing to wear. Even my brain can’t argue with that fact.