The Years of Living Nakedly

The Years of Living Nakedly

It's a big night for my parents. The friends have come over. The popcorn is popped and buttered and salted. Lively conversation coasts from the living room and into the kitchen where I'm planning my floor show. Why do old people lay about and gab and play Monopoly when they could simply sit back and let me amuse them? Who cares about who owns Marvin Gardens or who gets to be the Scotty Dog? It's Friday night, and all my parents can think to do is invite their friends over to play out their real estate fantasies in a languid waltz of little green plastic houses. Perhaps I'm just jealous because the Monopoly box is always cruelly out of my reach on the top shelf when I want to play -- as if I don't know enough not to swallow a game piece. At any rate, it's time for variety.

I strip down buck, saddle my wooden, wheeled, bright yellow Playschool giraffe and scoot into the living room. Adult heads turn and eyes squint as cheeks divide into smiles. I bear down hard as my wheels abruptly meet the green shag rug and strain to plow on through. This is the moment I've been training for. If I don't make at least one complete circuit around the coffee table the whole venture will have been wasted. However, before my round is even half way finished, it's obvious that I've reached my goal. I am the center of attention. Who needs board games and popcorn when you've got a naked kid and his wooden giraffe? My victory is short-lived, though. Amid chuckles and sniggers, Mom quickly scoops me up and Dad impounds my ride, but the damage has been done. After my little cabaret, Monopoly will pale in comparison. In short order I find myself doing time behind the netted walls of my play penitentiary, my senses still reeling from the heady intoxication of a job well done. Let Mom and Dad tromp back to their game. Once I bust out of the stir, no get-together in town will be safe from my naked abandon.

Whatever happened to the carefree days when we were young and didn't care what other people thought of us? When I was a little kid I wore absurdly generic clothes, shed them whenever my parents had company, scratched myself whenever I had an itch, and generally worked all manner of tomfoolery without any care as to what others would think.