The Naked Eye

One of the big attractions of naturism and social nudism is the exhilaration of moving naked through space. It’s all that “frolicking” that nudists seem to be universally known for. One of my earliest memories as a toddler was shimmying my clothes off to run naked around my room, jumping on and off the bed. But just a year or so after that, my first-grade teacher discovered that I needed glasses, and that was the beginning of many years of corrective eyewear for me. Wearing glasses or lenses, probably not just for me but for a lot of people, puts a damper on being physically active. It thwarts both your willingness and your ability. I remember running cross country and playing basketball while wearing one of those safety bands around my head to keep my glasses from flying off or from slipping down my sweaty nose. It made the glasses really tight, so the result was that I associated that unpleasantness with sports. When I started using contact lenses I discovered they aren’t really much better for physical activities, at least not the “hard” / semipermeable ones I used. Many times I lost or broke glasses or lenses. Of course there was always the option of simply not wearing any eyewear when swimming or at the beach, but in my case, anything beyond two feet in front of me was an incomprehensible blur. And I didn’t like the fact that my almost nude body could be clearly scrutinized by others, while I could not see theirs clearly at all.

In my mid-thirties I decided to pay for a LASIK procedure. That was ten years ago, and I’m very glad I did it, for many reasons, almost all of which do affect my love for being naked outdoors. It’s so much easier to swim, to go to the beach, to play volleyball, to run, to dance, anything. And, in comparison to wearing lenses, when I’m naked I literally am naked, right down to my eyes. Plus, it’s important to qualify that social nudism does indeed have to do with seeing and being seen, in the same way that any social activity among sighted people usually does. But seeing clearly at a naturist venue does not mean staring. What it means is that we see we are naked together, and we appreciate and celebrate our nudity both in its commonality and in its variety. We learn the range of human anatomy and physical ability in a way that is quite literally natural.

The kind of LASIK ad that speaks to nude (or might-as-well-be-nude) movement in nature. woolfsoneye.com

Now, LASIK isn’t for everybody, and this post is not meant to be a blanket endorsement for it. Not even everyone who would like to have the procedure can “qualify,” in the sense that first an opthamologist has to thoroughly examine your eyes to measure thickness of the cornea, degree of stigmatism, etc. and then determine if a LASIK procedure could correct your particular condition. Then there’s the expense… and the nerves. They gave me a valium, so I didn’t feel a thing, and it was over in ten minutes. My family, however, got to watch the procedure from another room on a closed-circuit TV, and were left somewhere between amazed and disgusted! Another drawback is that some folks have serious problems afterwards, like halo vision at night, or extreme dryness of the eyes.

But it’s definitely something to consider if you’re a naturist 21 or older who uses corrective eyewear and qualifies for LASIK. In my case, after the procedure I was told that I’d still probably need to start wearing reading glasses at 40. I’m five years past that age without that need. And even though I’ll no doubt have to start wearing reading glasses at some point in the not-too-distant future, the need for reading glasses is a much smaller need than what I had before.

Final score: Years of lens-free nudity: 10, Regrets: 0.