Ah, melanoma. The bane of all fair-skinned, blue-eyed people!

I grew up in Southern California in the 60s and despised summer. Spring wasn't great either and sometimes neither was fall. I suppose it's more accurate to say that I hated bright sunshine, which where I lived was pretty much all year round. But summer was the worst. Without the structure of the school day, my friends would hang out for hours at the beach or by a pool while I was grumpily sitting in what shade could be found, trying to look like I was having a nice time. Sunblock back then was practically non-existent. Oh, sure, we had Coppertone, but the spf was probably something like 2%. If I slathered it on me from head to toe, I could be in the sun for maybe 10 minutes before I turned bright pink. It smelled weird, didn't really rub in, and always broke my face out. Surfers and diehard beach-goers wore brightly colored zinc oxide on their noses and looked very cool. I looked ridiculous. It smelled awful, was really oily and I always managed to scratch some of it off. Plus, what was the point? It might have protected my nose, but what did that leave me with? A sunburned face and a white nose? And the freckles! Oh my lord, the freckles! Just walking across the quad to class was an invitation for them to pop up everywhere. Every. Where. I had a friend who, I swear, the moment Spring Break arrived was instantly tan with zero freckles. She spent a huge part of her summers at the beach rubbing baby oil into her skin so she would tan even faster. She was the prototypical California Girl and I was heartbroken that I couldn't join her. 

Now that I am older (much, much older!), I can look back on those times and be happy that I had to stay out of the sun. I may have missed out on baking in the sun covered in baby oil, but I also missed out on a lot of premature age spots and, all vanity aside, skin cancer. Not to say that I was able to completely dodge getting sunburned. It is pretty much impossible to be as fair-skinned as I am and not at some point end up burned. If you've ever lived in a perpetually sunny area, you know what I mean. Your ears, the back of your neck, where you part your hair, the v in the neckline of your shirt, the tops of your sandaled feet. Any place the sun can hit your unprotected skin for any length of time will burn. 

Cancer has taken a bite out of my family. It took one grandmother and tried to take the other. It took my father. It took my brother. It plagued my 94-year-old mother during the last year of her life. It did its insidious work on several of my cousins. All kinds of cancer from breast to blood and everything in between including skin cancer. I may not be able to guard against the more pervasive types of the big C, but I do what I can to protect my skin, get a yearly mole-patrol and be happy that my younger self was not able to bake in the sand. 

Cheers!