Twighlight and Tanless Sunning

(photo cred eonline.com)

Is the vampire trend going to bring back pale-chic?

To make myself feel better about my pasty peel, I often evoke the idea, or tale, that back in the day, say Victorian times, white, pale, pasty, skin was all the rage. I’ve done some research on the topic, and it seems the reason white flesh was considered the best, had to do with class. Those who spent time working the fields, outdoors, would become sun-kissed and tanned, a marker of being part of a lower class. Those who remained fair likely spent their days indoors, away from the sun’s harsh rays, probably sipping champagne and eating strawberries (okay, I’m totally picturing scenes from Marie Antoinette). Still, in some non-western cultures, a colorless casing is considered a marker of beauty. Men and women all over Southeast Asia don facemasks, gloves (pre-MJ death), and hold umbrellas to protect their peels from the sun. But somewhere along the line in our culture, milky-white complexions gave way to bronzed bods, and those of us who are melanin-challenged were sent on fruitless expeditions, eager to enhance our epidermises.

Tanning salons are too dangerous, spray-tans too fake, and it’s really, really, tough to find the right bronzer. Now, I’ve been lucky. While my white pelt gets no color from the sun, (freckles if I’m lucky) I discovered body bronzer not too long ago.

Trying to tan without sun and cream, however, is quite the process. It involves the very careful application of face and body-bronzer, learning to add natural “highlights” and can be very dangerous for some light colored-clothes.

I think, though, there might be a glimmer of hope for us ghostly gals. And his name, is Robert Pattinson. No ladies, he doesn’t dig anemic flesh, but the whole vampire fad invading all forms of media is propping up the pasties. Pale is the new tan, and it’s all thanks to vampires.

Sure some of our pasty pals are thirsty blood-sucking, night-thriving, socially-deviant murderers. But others are becoming sex symbols. Forget the spray-tan and photoshopped complexions, it’s all about having a naturally colorless rind. Gone are the days of cancer-causing oils and reflectors; let us stand together and embrace our whiteness. If Edward and that guy from that Anna Paquin show can be paxty (a morph between sexy and pasty), we can too.

But alas, I am in LA, the birthplace of bronzed beauties. I think I actually help other people get more tanned by reflecting sun from my flesh. While I have faith that fair is coming back full-force, I’ll wait a bit to totally expose my membrane. Until then, I’ll be body bronzing.

Whispers from the West

(On the way into LA...blurry, delusional, just like the last leg of the road trip)

Lingering in Los Angeles

The City of Angels is, apparently, the City of Dreams. Flocked to by thousands of hopeful whatevers year after year, this place is a repository of unachieved aspirations. Investment bankers go to Wall Street, wishing for wealth (and up until last year, usually made a buck or two). Techies, Taiwan. Fashionistas flock to France. But it’s the dreamers who come to lala land. Hollywood. Starlets searching for roles. Writers pray for a pair of executive eyelids to land on that script, the screenplay that will change it all, if only someone in a suit could see it. Paper stacks of pilots are piled in dumpsters and washed-up one-time actresses serve burgers in Burbank.

A cab driver put it pretty succinctly the other night. He said something like, “everyone comes here thinking they’re going to be a star…that’s why there are so many people in Los Angeles.” Maybe it’s a city of delusional, and deluded, daydreamers. But it’s place of escape from the banal bankers and uptight antics of the East coast (Toronto INCLUDED).

I think, in life, those of us who are dreamers, will have a tougher time. No automatic employment after education or test to take to make you a professional. But I think it’s more exciting this way. And apparently, so do a lot of folks out here.

There is something special about this city. Something contrived; something contradictory. The Hollywood sign, for example, is meager and almost dilapidated, but still, it can sort of take your breath away. Because it IS Hollywood. Los Angeles. The City of Angels. The City of Dreams.