NUDE IS NOT RUDE

Spring Mornings

Spring is finally here, and at last it's warm enough to leave the heating off and get up and without having to bother about getting dressed. I can get my coffee, make breakfast, and have a think about what I'm going to wear when I eventually go out for the day, whilst I watch the world hurry past the window for a while. I don't think I'm particularly visible from the road, but I'm sure that some of the neighbours must have seen me naked at some point as I don't do much to try to hide it.

I live on the boundary where suburbia meets rural. My road folds back on itself without going anywhere as there are just fields to the west of my house, so everyone you see outside is local. It is the sort of town where people don't really talk to each other much, but everyone recognises everyone and you all nod to each other as you pass in the street. From my window I can see maybe twenty or thirty houses at a stretch, so that might be enough to get an idea of how important people think "covering up" is when in and around their own homes. So what do I see through my kitchen window in the mornings?

I have one neighbour who goes out into her garden for a cigarette most mornings, just wearing a fluffy white dressing gown that's not always as tightly done up as you might expect. Across the road the house has a front window that stretches almost floor-to-ceiling, and you regularly see the owners in their underwear as they like to keep the curtains open. There's the girl with the very long legs and very short skirts who rarely seems to bother with underwear and yet manages to bend over a lot as she's getting into her car. Two teenage sisters down the road regularly turn up from going out in five-inch heels and four-inch skirts, and spend a few seconds wriggling into longer skirts and pulling on hoodies before heading into their own house - so the parents "don't realise" what they were wearing a few minutes earlier. One neighbour only ever seems to wear underwear if her husband is home, and the rest of the time wears thin stretchy outfits that go almost transparent if the light catches them just right...

But this is fairly tame compared to a town I lived in a few years ago. If the weather was warm, my neighbour would come home from work, strip down to her knickers, and go and stand in the garden with a cup of tea or a glass of wine to unwind as she chatted to me over the fence. Another neighbour whose back garden I could see from my house used to have friends round every Friday, and in the summer they would frequently all end up naked sitting on her patio as they watched the stars. It was common to see people getting changed in front of open windows, and you would occasionally spot someone putting the bins out or getting something from their car in whatever they were - or weren't - wearing at the time.

These were both suburban semi-rural towns, and I can guarantee that if you asked these people if they considered themselves "nudists" or "naturists" the answer would be a definite "NO!". But what it does show is that public acceptance of casual nudity is a lot higher than we are often led to believe. If nudity just happens then no-one cares. It's only when someone asks them about it that they remember they are supposed to disapprove and get all 'offended'.