I had such an unexpected day today: I went to a BEACH and sat in the SUN. I went with two beach-experienced friends who coached me through the process, and I learned a lot; I took literal notes on a literal notepad. I applied sunscreen once before we left, and reapplied twice more while we were there, and STILL I would describe patches of my current skin color as fuschia, if I could spell fushcia, which spell-check assures me I cannot.

I put SPF 60 on my face/neck/eartops, and I wore a hat and sunglasses, and those regions seem fine so far. I started with SPF 50 on my shoulders/arms/chest/legs, and then re-upped with SPF 30 (the SPF 50 was a pump-bottle and I didn’t want to put it in my beach bag); my legs and lower arms are just faintly pink, but my chest and shoulders and upper arms are bright. I wonder if that bottle of SPF 50 might have been expired, or maybe the SPF 30 bottle was expired. Or maybe I am half-Dutch and an Indoors Type and never wear sleeveless or low-cut anything, and my never-public areas of skin would have been absolutely shocked by this experience no matter what. I had half an inch of cleavage showing today! CLEAVAGE!! Now it understands why I usually keep it protected!

Well! I would say the enormous defibrillator-level shot of vitamin D has nevertheless done me some extreme good. I am almost DAZED with it, or possibly it is mild sunstroke! I went home and drank a huge glass of water and a little can of pineapple juice and a regular can of diet Coke and another glass of water; and then after a couple hours I gingerly took my shirt off and used our aloe plant medicinally for the first time since purchasing it years ago, and put a nice layer of aloe all over the hot-pink areas. I let it dry (it smells a little…oniony? I did not expect that) while I CLEANED A BATHROOM (I am telling you: I am HIGH ON SUNSHINE), then washed my hands several times, then added a layer of Eucerin over the aloe. Now I am swanning around feeling wonderful but demanding sympathy.

May I recommend making friends who will do things like this with you? Actually, I cannot recommend it like that, because I didn’t even do that: these friends made friends with me. May I recommend coincidentally running into people who will make friends with you and then do things like this with you?

Also, may YOU recommend some after-sun products? I feel like I am going to wake up tomorrow feeling a little less swanny.