Swimsuit season: or how to induce depression

I think there's probably some kind of chemical surge, maybe some chemtrail or something that pops up this time of year and makes adult women temporarily delusional. "I think I'll buy a new swimsuit this year!" they think, like that's a thing you can just do. 

Let's just put aside for the moment the fact that we live in a godless culture where we wear chonies out in public like some kind of reenactment of a party at Xerxes' place. Some day, maybe I will weigh all that and become some kind of swimwear abolitionist, but for now I'm just gonna strive for slightly above average American modesty standards.

When I was a kid, I just wore whatever, and then I was a teenager and I wore whatever was the absolute dorkiest possible option, because of both my dorkiness and the craftiness of my parents. I spent my weeks ensconced in yards and yards of pleated plaid and my weekends in Tweety Bird one pieces, waaaay past the acceptable Tweety Bird age of acceptability. Maybe because of these aggressive efforts, I managed to stay unmarried until the age of 17.

I'm gonna tell you something you might find depressing, 16-18 year olds. This is probably the best you're ever gonna look, godless-western-culturewise. You'll get smarter so you might have better hair and makeup someday, but your cellulite factor is at an all-time and unrepeatable low. Don't take it too hard, you're going to like yourself a lot better in 10 years, but you will want some fabric over your "problem areas" which are approximately from 6 inches above your kneecaps to about 3 inches below your chin. Just plan on covering all that up.

Somewhere out there, probably with the White Pants family, there are evidently women above their teens who have perfect swimsuit bodies. I only know about them because of Pinterest. (Sorry for any personal friends who thought I was referring to you) All of the stores that people like me go to have a million of suits for the White Pant crowd, and so we, the rest of us, go and try them on and then we cry a lot and eat nacho cheese from the can. I can't say I understand  the dynamic of "My body is disgusting, give me more food to eat for my body," but I participate.

Maybe I'll just become a burkini crusader, or start some feminist campaign against the oversexualization of our gender. Or maybe I'll buy a swimsuit with a long skirt and some big purple flowers and me and my mama can take mother/daughter pictures. See, lots of options.