When asked to think of a photograph which represents us in some way, I was flooded with images - of me, taken by me, some which might not seem to include me at all. But the one I landed on is iconic among our family photos: myself, aged around 5 years old, suspended at the waist by a huge tire swing, completely naked.
I believe we were in Baltimore at a gathering for family I'm very distantly related to. The kids had been playing in one of those shallow, plastic pools and I suppose I had tired myself out. I stripped off my bathing suit in the middle of the yard, surrounded by people who, for the most part, I hardly knew. The next logical step, obviously, was to climb into a tire swing and sway slowly for awhile.
I didn't know I was being photographed, but it now sits in one of my favorite volumes of our family's collection.
The idea that I had no concept of shame over my body, that I acted so instinctively on what I wanted, and that what I wanted was such a simple pleasure... I just like to look at that picture from time to time and know that those things are in me, still a part of me.
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