All of us are born naked and most of us are comfortable in early childhood without clothing, but somewhere along the way, most people in America and quite a few other places lose that comfort with their skin. It’s one thing to learn to wear clothing in settings that call for it, but regrettably, a lot of us learn a sense of shame and lewdness about the human body that God never intended.

Hi! I go by “Ramblinman” on Sunnyday’s message board and I want to share vignettes from my past that show how I found my way back to a childlike confidence and happiness in just my skin. Of course, I had times of doubt and confusion along the way, but to counteract that, God brought many wonderful people and events into my life. Right won out over wrong!

In this story, I’ll go by “Rick” since it is a more plausible first name than “Ramblinman”.

I have renamed everyone. The story is completely true, but until the public uproar over innocent nudity, nudism and naturism calms down, I’m using pen names for everyone!

I must give full credit to my parents for laying a foundation of wisdom about a lot of things, including cultivating common sense about the body and nudity.

We were a fairly normal family of four in the suburbs, Mom, Dad, my younger brother Jerry and me; but perhaps we were a little more casual about clothing than some families. Dad led the way. He was not a nudist in the strictest sense of the word, but during those rare times that he was without clothes, he seemed so at ease with it that I never forgot his good example and becoming a nudist later in my life was not too big a stretch.

As I was growing up, Dad would tell us stories about his childhood in a small southern town. On one occasion, he mentioned that, as children, he and his brother used to go fishing in the river right outside of town. When the fishing was slow, they dropped their fishing poles, shucked off their clothes and swam naked in the river in plain view of passersby. I couldn't believe it when I first heard it, but he said that in those days, “People didn't give a second thought to “two nekkid boys in the river”, just wasn’t anything unusual”.

This story resonated with me. I wanted such adventures for myself, if I could work up the courage.

Jerry and I are only 18 months apart in age, so once he got to be three or four, we spent the rest of our childhood as close companions.

When Jerry and I were little, Mom and Dad bathed with a half-open door. They wanted to remain within earshot if we needed them and family nudity was not a worry with small children as their only witness. After his bath, Dad did not put on pajamas or robe except in the coldest weather. We had a sociable neighborhood and folks would pop in unannounced, but bath time was always late in the evening and Dad’s naked time was never interrupted by unexpected visitors. As he wandered the house, Dad would check on our pets, make sure the doors were locked, the lights out and lastly, check on my brother and me; and of course no clothes were needed nor worn for any of these nightly chores. I didn’t know any other way of life. This was how our family did things.

The Little One

My parents used to read quite a few stories to me before I was old enough to read on my own. One particularly memorable story is entitled, “The Little One” by Dare Wright.

It is primarily a picture book, consisting of black and white photographs with short captions beneath each photograph.

The story opens with a doll named Persis. When we meet her, she is all alone in an abandoned house.

She was discovered by a turtle who wanders in from the meadow. Turtle wakes her up and beckons her outside.

Seeing her in a heavy dress and several thick petticoats, Turtle asks her, “Why are you wearing all those clothes on such a hot day?”

She realizes the turtle's point and promptly takes off every stitch of her clothing, discovering instantly how delightful it feels to walk in the sunshine, totally unclad.

As she ventures out into the woods, Persis meets two bears, who adopt her as their own.

One bear is gentle and the other a bit gruff, but they both come to love her.

She is depicted wearing a flower garland from time to time, but more often than not, she is simply in her natural state, cheerfully playing outdoors with her new family.

The story goes on to describe several adventures Persis and the bears have. In short, they lived happily ever after! No further mention is made in the captions of her nudity, she is simply depicted that way in the remainder of the photographs.

There were some parallels in this story to my own life. Like the bears, Mom and Dad took me in when I was a small child, raising me as their own.

I had no trouble accepting the premise that in the right place and time, just like Persis, we can enjoy nature better without the hindrance of clothing to muffle the pleasant sensation of warm sunshine and gentle breezes. Of course, the book communicates several other positive messages: encouraging us to venture out of our comfort zone to discover the world in all its beauty; we don’t have to be lonely, we can find people to share the world with, and in time, we will learn to recognize their love whether or not they are skillful at verbally communicating it.

Although I did not play totally naked like Persis in the storybook, my childhood companions and I did spend much of our summer days wearing neither shirt nor shoes, only a pair of shorts. Those barefoot days toughed the soles of our feet to resemble shoe leather and the sun turned our skin brown except for what the shorts covered. In such scant attire, we roamed our backyards, built fortresses of pine straw and scrap wood and played ball. As we grew a little older, we wandered down to the creek to splash in the waters or catch crawdads. The trails along the creek led out of the subdivision to pastures and countryside beyond. One day we found a few horses waiting for us at the fence line, so we plucked long spikes of fescue grass to feed them.

I have heard it said, “We mustn’t let the good become the enemy of the perfect”. Meaning, at least in this case: although in other parts of the world, children have the blessing of society to live out their summer days in total nudity, I am glad for what we had: a summer without shoes and shirts, which offered us a taste of simple living and made some of us long for the even greater comfort of a summer without the shorts as well.

Our society seems at odds with the simple truths my parents taught me, including the innocent natural freedom found in the pages of The Little One, but how can one entirely forget such a book? I sure didn’t!

Looking back, I can see the way God used my parents, friends and the memory of a gentle children’s storybook to guide me back to common sense.

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it. Proverbs 22:6

"The Little One" by Dare Wright. (The link is to Amazon.) (Out of print and a bit expensive, but might still be worth the effort to obtain.)

Bath time with Our Cousins

When Mom’s brother came to visit with his wife and daughters, Lisa and Kellie, they would stay a few days at our house. My brother and I were just reaching school age, roughly ages 4 and 6 and the girls were close to the same age. When bath time arrived, there were four kids to bathe and just one tub. Mom did the practical thing and put all of us, boys and girls together in the tub. Some years later, I asked Mom about that and she said, “It had come time that you learned what girls looked like; and it did the girls some good too, after all, they have no brothers, just you and your brother to learn ‘the bare necessities’”.

To adults, the bath with the girls might seem like a major life lesson. To Jerry and me, this “great revelation” was simply an interesting side note to a fun-filled visit with our extended family.

We were proud to show the girls the plastic ships that regularly sailed the waters of our tub, and they brought their rubber ducky to swim with the ship.

Emulating the Example of Adam and Eve

When I was nine years old, our Sunday School teacher, Mrs. Ford, endeavoring to teach us about creation and God’s plan for humanity, brought in a huge poster of Adam and Eve kneeling in prayer.

Adam and Eve were facing one another in a kneeling position, and implicitly totally nude, but positioned in a way that the poster revealed nothing more than the sides of their rumps and a hint of Eve’s breasts in a natural pose, without a lot of 'strategically-placed' shrubs.

Above them, the Holy Spirit was ever so close, bathing Adam and Eve in a glorious light.

Mrs. Ford didn’t comment on the nudity, but she didn’t hide it either. The message was clear that our natural state was what God had in mind and “it was good”. There were no barriers between God and people, no barriers between man and woman. The first thought in my mind as a nine year old, “This looks like how things are supposed to be. Then why do we wear clothes; at least when it's not cold outside?” When I got around to verbalizing that thought, Mrs. Ford said, “Eden was never too hot nor too cold, Adam and Eve had everything they need just as you see them; God was right there with them too”.

I don’t live in Eden, but even here, we really don’t need clothes much of the year, only some of the time. I knew without a doubt that I wanted to be just like Adam and Eve before they sinned, in every way possible.

One day, I came to class early and told Mrs. Ford that I wanted to be a Christian. I knew that before they sinned, Adam and Eve walked with God in the Garden. That was the coolest thing ever! She prayed with me and I asked Jesus to come into my heart and forgive my sins. I didn’t quite understand everything we prayed about, but five years later, I prayed the same prayer with better understanding and truly began the journey, the same journey I am on now.

Summer Camp

But there’s more to tell about my childhood:

The summer I turned eleven, I went to church camp along with dozens of other boys and girls my age.

We children spent each night in rustic bunkhouses. A few yards away was a bathhouse for boys and another one nearby for girls. The camp kitchen was in yet another building down the way.

Each morning, we boys raced to our bathhouse, unceremoniously shed our clothes, showered and climbed over the fixtures like a jungle gym, not wearing a shred of clothing for an hour or more each morning until the camp counselor told us to quit the horseplay and dress for breakfast.

One morning, one of the boys named Tim called out for all to hear that I was sprouting hair at my groin. I had just turned 11 as were most of the other boys, but in this one area, I was different, “a hairy monkey” according to Tim.

Thankfully Mr. Jones, our counselor overhead this teasing and immediately called a meeting, “Tim! In the bunkhouse. You, too! (pointing right at me.) In the bunkhouse! On the double!”

Mr. Jones was a tall, fit ex-Marine still wearing his military flat-top haircut and not about to take any nonsense. He was also one of the hairiest men I have ever met. Mr. Jones said, “Tim, in a few months, you are going to sprout hairs around your groin just the same as Rick. He is just a few months ahead of you. When your change begins, there won’t be a bit of difference between the two of you.

“Now, Tim, I want you to apologize to Rick, and I want both of you, yes, both of you to shake hands and let bygones be bygones. Done? Great job, boys! Now go to the mess hall; it’s time for breakfast”.

I will forever be grateful for this intervention and life lesson.

But I was not done learning lessons at this summer camp.

As blasé as we boys were about playing naked in our bathhouse every morning, we were mighty curious about all those girls in their bathhouse. One morning, a few of the bolder boys scoped out the girl’s bathhouse perched on a steep hillside. These boys saw that from the high ground at the back side of the girl’s bathhouse, it was only an easy hop up to the roof.

I was standing a few yards away, wondering how this would play out.

Sure enough, four of the boys took the leap and were on the roof.

Without a doubt, the girls heard the boys stomping across the roof, not knowing what was to come. They didn’t have long to find out; to their shock, they saw grinning, awestruck boys staring down at them. They screamed and ran for their towels hanging on the pegs. Hearing the uproar, our camp counselors came running up and called those boys off the roof. Then they sternly warned all of us about the danger of walking on rooftops and chastised the Peeping Toms among us for such rude behavior.

I agree that it was inappropriate behavior for both those reasons, but I think it is also regrettable that in our effort to teach respect between the sexes, we don’t provide a healthy outlet for natural curiosity to be addressed, with parents or chaperones to keep things courteous.

Of course, we did get some better-supervised time with the girls (who had been so rudely spied upon). Mr. Jones’ wife was a camp counselor too. She had charge of about eight girls and brought them to meet Mr. Jones and his boys for a cookout in the woods. Mr. Jones showed everyone how to make a hearty stew. We mixed potatoes, carrots, onions, ground beef and a dash of salt, wrapped it all in a foil wrapper, put each bundle into the coals and ate them for our lunch. Delicious! Then Mrs. Jones gave us each a pocket-sized songbook and we sang gospel songs. I love to sing, and was excited to be singing about Jesus. In my heart, I was singing to Jesus, not just about him. By the way, I still own that singalong songbook!

Clearing up a Mystery

Sometimes a mystery can baffle you for years.

Right as my 7th grade school year was winding down, one of my brother’s friends Larry, came up to me and said, “I saw the darnedest thing yesterday, Karin Nordstrom and all her brothers came running out of the front door of their house naked, ran into the back yard and disappeared back into the house”. I replied, “Are you sure, Larry? Who would do that?” Karin was one of my classmates and I had a huge crush on her, so there was no way I would ever repeat a story like that about her, so the rumor died right there. Years later, I ran into Karin again when we were both adults and we had an afternoon to talk about school days and more recent news. Finally, I had to ask her about that story of her streaking with her brothers. She admitted that it was true, it was just a crazy stunt when they were bored. Not only that, she and her family had been nudists and regulars at a nudist camp about 3 hours from our home town. Other than this one crazy stunt, their nudist life had been a well-kept secret. Even in school I knew there was something different about her, but never could figure out exactly what.

Summers at the Swim Club

We had a wonderful place to swim close to home. A large hotel down near the airport offered a swimming pool membership for people who lived in town. They offered a huge outdoor pool surrounded by a privacy fence and we swam there several days a week, all summer long from childhood through our early teens. Mom provided boxer swim shorts for my brother and me to wear to the pool, but it seemed that we were always outgrowing them and typically they were a tight fit. One summer, as I was starting to feel a little self-conscious, I complained to Mom that the girls could see “too much” since the swim trunks hugged every curve of my groin. But Mom just laughed and said, "Don't worry about it. Everyone knows what boys look like". I hoped she was right. In fact, if any of the girls could see my “all in all”, they either didn’t notice or noticed but didn’t seem to care. Everyone was just talking, diving, swimming. I was just another kid in the pool and I quit focusing on myself. It was time to just have fun!

There were quite a few girls in the swim club with us. One of the girls, Marci, never wore a top, just a bikini bottom. And for that matter, after a few minutes of swimming and diving, her cloth bikini bottom would ride up. She was a bundle of energy, always in and out of the water, with no time to tug the fabric back in place, so her bottom remained almost as bare as her top. Every summer that followed, this was her only attire at the pool. Marci was a slender girl, a little late to bloom, but as she reached her 12th birthday, she was definitely starting to bud, yet steadfastly remained top-free. By this summer (I had just turned 13) Marci and I were both stealing glances at one another, not from the sight of lots of bare skin; we were used to that; but a boy-girl crush was definitely in the making.

Perhaps we kids at the swim club wore less than is common, but in this secluded world, that was our “normal”.

Boy Scout Camping Trip

I joined Boy Scouts a bit later than most boys, not until I was 13, but as long as I was in, I was all in, studying my campcraft, nature skills and preparing hard for each merit badge.

One summer, our troop went on a weekend campout far from the city, to a wooded plot of land owned by one of our troop families. We went fishing in a pond right by the camp, picked peas at the invitation of the farmer near us and began to explore the woods around us.

The camp was also adjacent to a river. Soon a couple of the boys came running back with the news, “We found a beach! We found a beach!” Sure enough, just up river was a huge beach, right along the riverside, apparently built for another campground. None of us had swim trunks and not even a change of underpants, so we did the obvious thing: taking off every stitch of clothing on the beach and ran naked into the cool river to free our bodies from the summer heat and sweaty clothes. We city kids don’t get to do such things back in town. But here, we could skinny dip and there was not a soul to tell us not to.

Well, until the scoutmaster called us back to camp. We were out of sight over at the beach and he didn’t like that. But we had our moment in the sun, no one can take that from us.

Family Trip to The Lake

The summer I turned 14, our family joined our cousins at the lake, about halfway between our homes. My uncle rented a houseboat and a motorboat and we spent a week water skiing, swimming and exploring the islands in this vast lake.

One night, we kids were all in bed for the night when we heard a couple of loud splashes and a lot of laughing. Kellie, the youngest of us went running out to check and just as quickly hurried back. She cried, “Eww! The grownups are all naked and jumping off the boat into the lake!” My aunt called out, “I heard that! You kids go back to bed!” And I could hear all the adults laughing at Kellie’s “Eww” complaint.

I wasn’t about to go up there to see everyone naked, but I was instantly jealous. Throughout that sultry hot week at the lake I had lived in my swim suit except for bedtime and the trunks had never dried out. Suffice to say that in those conditions, covering even the slightest bit of my body had not been good for my skin.

I was determined to shed those swim trunks, “…but how would I do it and get away with it?” I asked myself. This was a family vacation on a public lake after all!

Well, the next day I had my chance. My uncle and half the family went off in the motorboat to ski in the main channel of the lake while the rest of us remained anchored in a quiet cove of the lake, just offshore.

My parents were relaxing with a book and magazine below the deck. I called out to them that I was going to explore the shore. They responded, “Don’t be gone too long!” and I promptly jumped into the lake, wearing my swim trunks and carrying an inner tube. A few yards out from the boat, with no one in sight, I slipped my trunks off, wearing them on the sleeve of my arm and swam naked in broad daylight right to the shore. Still no one in sight, so I walked up the rocky bank and slipped into the woods, going natural outdoors for the second time in my life. It felt wonderful, more wonderful than I could imagine. Finally, all my skin could be soothed by fresh air and sunlight. The wet swimsuit blues were a thing of the past. I roamed my woodland paradise as long as I dared, reluctantly returning to the houseboat, wearing my swim trunks as if they’d always had been on, but I smiled, knowing different!

This skinny dipping business was getting addictive!

On our last day, both our families took a hike on a nature trail around the lake. My older cousin Lisa was keeping pace with me, but we were both sweating in the summer heat. I had long ago shed my shirt and was wearing only a pair of cutoffs and my shoes. I was sweating too, but clearly more comfortable than Lisa. Lisa sidled closer and told me in a whisper, “I so wish that I could hike without a top like you”. I replied, “It is more comfortable for me this way”. At 13, she had reached the point where her breasts were “too developed to leave uncovered”, at least according to the way things are. I had no idea there actually is another world where, if you know where to go, men and women, boys and girls don’t wear a stitch of clothing in all but the coldest weather, certainly not in hot weather. It would be quite a few more years before I discovered that world. Neither did I know that the places where people lived this way were much closer than I realized.

Coach Lee

My junior year in high school, I took a sociology class led by Coach Lee.

As far as I know, all our coaches had teaching jobs in addition to their coaching responsibilities. They tended to be "by-the-book" guys, never deviating from the prescribed curriculum, methodically paraphrasing or even reading each chapter word-for word from the textbook.

Coach Lee was not one of those guys.

At every turn, he tried his dead level best to get us to imagine other cultures, not from our own perspective, but from, as much as humanly possible, the vantage point of the people we were studying. Not that he asked us to favor other cultures over ours, he just wanted us to understand them.

Coach Lee took particular delight in getting us to admit that we had cultural biases that we didn't even realize.

One morning he had such a surprise waiting for us.

As soon as roll call was out of the way, he walked up to the whiteboard and introduced this premise: "Imagine," he said, "a highly civilized country, not too different from America, where, kids, from the very first day they attended school at five years old, were naked the entire day; boys and girls sharing the same classroom, also naked for recess, naked for lunch, just naked!"

The room went silent. You could have heard a pin drop. "Secondly," he continued, "imagine that this is all these children knew every day thereafter until the day of their graduation, when they would be roughly 18 years old".

"I know this may sound a little weird, but please hear me out," he asked.

One of the guys in back said, "Yeah, Coach, you topped the weirdness chart for real this time!" It took a minute or two for Coach Lee to restore order to the classroom after that outburst.

But Coach Lee wasn't backing down. "We all know how little kids in our own society don't mind nudity one bit at preschool age, probably up to kindergarten," he said. "What I am suggesting to you is that this thing we have about nudity in mixed company, likely embarrassment, thinking of it as something sexual, is entirely what we have all learned from our culture, not something that develops instinctively".

One of the girls, blushing a bit, mustered the courage to share her concerns openly, "But Coach Lee, we all know that people our age feel strong attraction for the opposite sex, is there any chance that I would be treated with respect in such a setting?"

Coach Lee responded, "Absolutely! This would be a regular classroom in a conventional school in every other sense of the word. Misbehavior or off-color remarks would send a guy to the principal's office right away. Besides, these kids would have known one another since they were five years old and have almost never seen one another clothed in all the 13 or so years of their education. It would be their normal!"

Some of the students were still shaking their heads in disbelief, but for most of us, Coach Lee's point was not lost on us: Much of the way we live our lives is based upon our own unique culture. Not that there isn't universal right and wrong, but maybe we won't be so quick to evaluate other cultures based on our own standards.

END - Part 1