How I Found Out I Was Pale

You know how you can remember the weirdest and most obscure moments from your life but don’t realize you are talking to your sister on the very phone you are explaining to her that you can’t find? The brain is such a weird thing. Random memories pop up at the strangest times with no warning and are as clear to me as the day they happened. I have a long list of insanely oddball things I recall from my childhood, and they serve no real purpose. I take that back. At least one of them serve a pretty important purpose - it reminds me of where I came from and how far I have come.

Summer vacation in the 80s

My family and I were on summer vacation in the mid-80s. I was around the age of 10. This wasn’t too long before my obsession with tanning began in earnest. After a long, hot day at Silver Dollar City in Branson, Missouri, we headed for the front gate and boarded the tram. Seated near us was a family of three. An older man and woman and a young woman I assumed to be in her mid to late 20s were across the aisle from us. They were discussing their day, joking, and laughing with one another.

Wait, being pale is a bad thing?

One thing about that day sticks in mind. The girl seated with her parents was complaining about her skin. She stretched her legs into the narrow aisle and examined her legs. I remember her patting her thighs and saying, “Look at them! My legs look like dead fish!” At the time, everyone around laughed with her as she bemoaned the fact that she wasn’t darker and couldn’t achieve the coveted tan of the 80s. I can still hear her unmistakable northern accent, especially the way she emphasized the words “dead fish.”

I remember looking down at my own white legs with the knobby knees not even a shade off from hers. If I am being honest, I think I looked at my legs and back to hers several times during our tram ride. Her concerns over not being tan enough sort of morphed into my concerns. If she was worried about showing her pale legs, shouldn’t I be?

Beginning of a love for tanning

It would be a couple more years before I would begin to act on my concerns, but I definitely never forgot that young woman’s remark. I can’t recall any of the experiences we had in the park that day as distinctly as I can her comment. My mother and grandmother were both sunbathers, and I believe hearing that random stranger whose complexion was so similar to my own complaining about the way we looked set in motion something that would change my life. I began thinking about the way I looked and, for the first time, compared my own skin to that of my mother and grandmother. Now I knew other people might see my skin as less than up to par, and I wanted to do something about it.

I am not saying the stranger on the tram was the reason I developed skin cancer, but her own self-deprecation sort of leaked into my own psyche. Living as a tween in the era of big hair, after-school specials, and MTV, it was inevitable that I would encounter the desire to tan. This young lady’s off-hand comment just opened that door a crack. The Hawaiian Tropic ads and my suntan Barbie shoved me headlong through the door and slammed it shut.

More growing, less tanning

I’ve grown a lot since that summer - in more ways than one. I graduated from college, earned a Masters in Reading and Literacy, taught for nearly 23 years, and raised two children. I have also survived melanoma and had three basal cell carcinomas removed from my neck and shoulder. My dermatologist tells me tanning was the culprit. I know he’s right.

It’s time we really make some headway and change the stigma surrounding pale skin. Until we do, strangers on trams and images in the media will forever influence the 10-year-old who becomes the 45-year-old with skin cancer scars. Do your part. Tell someone that pale is its own kind of beautiful. It’s the truth. You never know who's listening.