Bikini Tops

Until recently, I never wore them. Almost never - though you might be able to dig up a photo of me from 1973 wearing a pink one with white polka dots. Or a1950's style one I got  in 1998 to wear at the Jersey Shore and in Puerto Rico.

And then there was the one I bought in 2003 so I could breastfeed Trinity at a friend's pool.

But otherwise, as much as I've always mostly approved of my body, I always secretly prided myself on never being "stupid" enough to think I could get away with flaunting the gut which I'd mostly accepted. Or exposing my D cups to that much scrutiny

A couple of months ago, my friend Clare gave me this brown and pink hand-me-down string bikini that, she said, needed to go to someone with big boobs. I put it on. "It's really revealing, don't you think?" I asked her. "Um, yeah. It's a bikini."

Just yesterday I was saying how tired I've gotten of being cold. This was the first winter (and early spring) that had really gotten to me since moving to California fourteen years ago.

But it was surprisingly warm when I stepped outside today.

I was gonna drive to the beach wearing my rash guard and fleece yoga pants. But after I stepped outside and felt the life giving rays of the sun, I walked back inside and put on a bikini top.

Very surfer girl of me, I thought. Even with the gut.