Oh, Mr. Sun

Parts of my family are black-Irish and parts of my family are of the classic, potato-famine variety. This means some of us have dark hair and skin and some of us make Robert Pattinson look like George Hamilton.

Guess which skin tone I was blessed with? Ah yes. The almost-translucent pale tone. If I had red eyes, I would look like a rabbit. Yet every summer, I get a bug up my ass that I'm going to get a tan even though it's practically impossible.

This summer was no exception. Patrick and I go to the in-law's pool to lay around and drink sangrias. As soon as I change into my swimsuit, Patrick has his finger on the nozzle of sunscreen, prepared to spray me down like a toddler. I raise my arms in defeat and submit to the sunscreen spray down.

I didn't swim as much as I just floated around the pool like a complete sloth, sunglasses on my face and a sangria in my hand at all times. It was marvelous. On a scorching hot day, there is just nothing better than just floating in a pool. I love it.

After hours of indulging in too much sangria and sunshine, Patrick staged an intervention. I glance up from the pool to see him, completely dressed, shaking his head saying, "You've had enough. It's time to step out of the pool."

Of course I'm in denial at this point and protest that I need at least one more sangria's worth of sun. But he tells me the sunscreen wasn't rated for the ultra pale and my skin was ripening to a nice shade of lobster. I didn't believe him until I took a shower and it felt like shards of glass were shooting from the shower head.

Now, my skin is still peeling like an onion and I'm swearing off the sun without sunscreen with a SPF of at least 100. Until next year that is.