My eyes beheld the sign, Shady Oak, A Nude Family Resort. What ?
I turned off of the lonely dirt road into the resort that was hidden away within the pristine country side. Carefully, I pulled my truck passed the huge wooden fence that surrounded the complex and through the massive double iron gates that opened ever so slowly. With brow slightly furrowed, I followed the winding single lane road around to the stage area where the band was already setting up on stage. No one had told me that clothes were optional on this gig. William's my name, music’s my game.
I glanced around the retreat and found a little comfort in the fact that most of those that I had seen on the way in were fully clothed, and although being a man of modesty, I felt reasonably assured that this may be one of my more interesting gigs. Besides, I really wasn’t going to look anyhow.
As I loaded my guitar and amp on stage, I became suspiciously aware that the band had already stripped down to their T-shirts. Hmmm, I thought. It is rather hot and humid today, I reasoned, I guess they are staying cool by whatever means necessary to be comfortable. As my imagination took off on a whim, an instant visual presented itself. I could foresee them heckling me, playing, singing, dancing on stage, butt naked, chiding me, and calling me chicken for playing with my clothes on. Heckling one of your own in the music business is not a good sign.
We finished a sound check as twilight settled around us. Our stage lights held no color gels, so we were illuminated by bright and blinding light. Being an open-air stage with no cover became the perfect fly zone for famished mosquitoes buzzing about for blood. I am one of those people that could be standing in the middle of a desert, and one of those varmints could smell me from fifty miles away, dive bomb me with his stinger straw, and begin slurping.
We fired up the first tune and people began to saunter through the twilight, making their way toward the music like moths drawn to a flame. I’ve always been mystified by the power that music has on people. I’m one of them myself.
They came slowly into view, they were just shadowy figures at first, blotted out partly by the fading sun. and the bright lights of the stage. But I could assess that they were primarily in skin suits. Nekid. Yes, naked. Most of them anyway. But I really wasn’t looking.
Some of them began to dance, as one kindred spirit, appearing to be a female, with lit baton torches, began waving them about in some sort of ritualistic celebration. Oh to the great Gods of the sun, moon and stars, we have gathered to commemorate in our natural habitat. From whence we came to when we go. Okay, here we go.
I’ve never been one to gawk or stare, and I sure didn’t want to start here. That’s all I needed, was to be the stranger that this tribe senses as an intruder. I was beginning to blend, and I didn’t want to be thrown to the ground, have my clothes ripped from my body, and ran naked thru a belt line.
I had to be cool about this whole experience, and at the same time, share later share with my spouse, this escapade into naturalism. Even though, I really wasn’t looking. (After all, I didn’t want my last piece of writing to read: “I bequeath all of my worldly possessions to my wife and children.”
I’ve tried to find in my mind, where a person actually makes a conscious decision to one day just declare; “I’m joining a nudist colony today!” I’ve heard of nude beaches, but I guess this is the same endeavor, only a nude forest.
As the evening wound to an end, I couldn’t help but feel a sense of astonishment. And wouldn’t you know it, as up thru the night, rose a marvelous site…a full moon. I thought it so symbolic of the outcome.
Great last paragraph.