Eyes FRONT Soldier!

A few weeks ago we had yet ANOTHER random holiday here in Europe - Ascension Thursday. According to Newadvent.org "Ascension Thursday is the 40th day after Easter signaling the ascension of Christ into Heaven. The feast, falling on this particular Thursday, is one of the Ecumenical feasts ranking with the feasts of the Passion, Easter and Pentecost among the most solemn in the calendar. "

Interesting - this equates to a day off for me so whatever. And happily I accepted an invitation with some friends to go to a sauna in Harlem. Sounded like a much needed blissfully relaxing sojourn.

Now I'm pretty versed in biblical history - a bit of a fascination of mine - but I'm willing to conceded that I'm certainly no expert. HOWEVER, I do believe when recounting the "solemn feasts" I'm not sure that feasting your eyes on dozens and dozens of naked bodies is exactly what the Good Lord had in mind. Sounds more like the other guy's idea of a good time - you know, the one a little further south.

I get picked up in the mid morning for a nice long day of relaxation and chatting with my girlfriends. In the car we are catching up as I haven't seen one of them in a very long time. And I hear from the front seat something about "mixed" in reference to the sauna. Now admittedly I have a very bad habit of only half-listening sometimes so I chalked this weird uttering up to my not hearing correctly. Unfortunately, I should have been paying better attention. A few minutes later it comes up again and having listened a bit closer start to feel a panicky lump in my throat.

Kate: Uh - what did you say about mixed? what does that mean?

Girls: You now, it's both women and men

Kate: Stunned silence

Girls: Didn't you know that?

Kate: WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?!?!?! [screaming from the backseat]

Girls: What?, that's normal.

I should say that I was going with all German ladies and apparently ambling around naked with men and women is par for the course. But they also will happily get out of a 140 degree sauna and jump into an ice bath so I'm not putting a lot of stock into what constitutes "normal" here. Good if you are looking to actually kill yourself – bad if you’re, um, I don’t know…SANE!

So for a solid few minutes I freaked out - thinking...I wondering how badly I'll hurt myself if I jump out of a moving car? I love my thought process on this one though – I am going to be naked in front of many many random people and the first thing that pops into my head is "all these people are going to see my butt!" Um – more things to be concerned with in the front but I focus on my ass. Please – I don’t even like looking at my ass let alone having hundreds of men look at it. Egad!!!

I went silent and contemplated the next hours of my life and what would unfold here. After accepting my fate (and cursing myself for not bringing some kind of flask of alcohol with me) I just decided to suck it up and get in a good frame of mind. It’s actually a lot easier than I thought. When we got there the place is GORGEOUS! It's a huge complex with 8 saunas, steamrooms, pools, an outdoor area, sun deck and lounging places and restaurants.

Weird thing was it actually was fine. It was strange how normal it became - now I get what these Germans were telling me. Although there were some unwelcome sights AND a horrifying comment made to me in the pool which made me VERY aware that I was naked suddenly. It must be that when your brain is confronted with so much naked flesh all at once it freaks out and shuts down.

So all in all my first co-ed naked sauna experience was unexpected, yet good! I survived (and even tried out the sun deck when I felt daring!)

Although I have some words of advice for the general masses - ENOUGH WITH THE PIERCINGS! The age of the piercings is something I won’t miss when it passes. EGAD! You gotta be kidding me!!!!!!!!!