On Skin, and the More and Less of it.

Today was my routine six month appointment with my dermatologist. Thanks to my remarkably thorough Northern European heritage on both sides, and a hardy dose of melanoma in my family history, neither I nor my dermatologist take these meetings lightly. I cannot leave a dermatology office without a divot of skin removed. Consequently, my body now looks like the landscape of a golf course practice tee.
It started at an age when I was too young to appreciate that the mole removed from somewhere in the vicinity of my undeveloped breasts would, as my pediatrician phrased it, “not distract from the bikini” I would one day wear. These inspections continued through college, when I would come home over school break and submit to the smattering of mole removals from foot, finger, lower back. Once I became an adult with my own insurance, I approached the task of finding the right skin remover with due diligence: the office was close to mine. I could squeeze in a visit over my lunch hour.
One should not underestimate the emotional duress of undergoing a full-body scrutiny for the first time. Where there is skin, there could be skin cancer. In short, lots of nakedness is involved, and I’m the only one playing this game. The day came when I donned my birthday suit in front of Dr. Kim. We upheld all statutes of professional decorum, enduring the breast-lifting to look beneath, and the – yes, I’ll say it – cheek-spreading, to, ahem, cover all bases.
Then I moved away for a while.
When I returned to New York, by pure coincidence, my new job was in the same neighborhood and offered the same insurance. I scheduled a follow-up. In the exam room, I sat with nothing on but a flimsy paper dress tied shut with a plastic string serving as a meager nod towards dignity. I comforted myself that at least he’d seen it all before. In walked Dr. Kim.
Only.
It wasn’t the Dr. Kim who had seen my most private nooks and crannies a year earlier. It was, by sheer dumb luck, a different Dr. Kim who just happened to succeed the other Dr. Kim.
What’re the odds, I ask?
The amusement factor got me through the new once-over (so unfair), and then that asshole got married and moved to New Jersey. Next! His successor sang the praises of cosmetic enhancements. Her successor is who I saw today.
I’ve gotten over the whole naked thing. It could be that this is my fifth doctor. It could be that I’m getting too old for modesty. These days I show up, I strip to my skivvies, and she sees more of me than I do.
My laissez-faire attitude does not extend to my age. Today, I asked her about my skin care options for my aging forehead, stressing that I was going to be 39 this year. My doctor, who is as white as I am – and I make this point because there are some ethnicities for whom aging seems magically elusive – chuckled, and said, “I’m sorry to laugh, but I’m 62.”
This woman doesn’t look a day over 45. The secret of her success?
“Sunscreen.”
I understand that the Evil Rays will age me before my time. I already am that freak who will spend a day at the beach wearing a sun hat and SPF 50 while sitting under an umbrella. But this woman either has the best sunscreen known to man, or there’s a painting getting older in an attic somewhere. Regardless, my faith in all things Shade has been renewed.
I may be dragged to 39 kicking and screaming, but I’ll get there pale as a ghost and with one less wrinkle on my face. And one more divot on my body.