Pale is the new Tan!

“It is the individual woman who feels herself to be at fault for not matching up to the current imagery. It is not that the image is discordant. Her sightline has become faulty. She is now energised to make the new images her own signature and to express herself through these new forms. She apples herself to the job of perfecting that image for herself and so makes it her own, not assaultive or alien.” (Orbach, 2010; 29)

An alien, yes, that was exactly how I felt when I was walking through Gateway without my leggings for the first time. I felt ashamed and embarrassed. I was so uncomfortable because I felt that my ‘white glow’ was standing out and that everyone was judging me. I felt like hiding under a huge carpet.

The sad thing is that I spent years worrying what ‘society’ thinks of me and the truth is that ‘they’ actually don’t care. I realised that people are all in the same boat. ‘They’ are all warring about themselves and how they look. No one rally is concerned on how white I am. I eventually started to enjoy the freedom of not wearing leggings and embraced  who I was, not caring that society makes out that tan skin is better than pale. I hope that this will teach me to never judge others for how they look or what they wear.