Naked Women Saved My Life

By Martin Johnson / New York City

The first time I stumbled onto a photograph of a naked woman in a magazine, I had an unusual epiphany: "I want to do that," my pre-teen  mind screamed silently.

I was probably nine at the time (I think it was 1969), and the response was utterly logical.  I was wearing two sweaters and corduroy pants in my parent’s Chicago home and still a bit chilly, as Windy City winters lived up to their freezing reputation.

The magazine was almost certainly Playboy, and Miss December or some such was walking nude along a beautiful beach.

Lust would arrive later. I just wanted to be as comfortable as she looked.  Not just soaking up the early morning sun, but comfortable in her skin.  She was physically self-confident in a way that I could barely (double entendre intended) imagine.

The thought of objectifying her was secondary.  To me, she was the latest example of women like Gloria Steinem and Shirley Chisolm who were breaking the limits set for women.

I reflect on that moment almost six decades later, and it’s fascinating to see how things have changed.  While far from the norm, men and women are looking at the female nude differently.  How did we get there?  First let’s look back. My journey might be instructive.

My discovery was an honest stumble. I grew up in a home so stuffed with reading material that it might have been a fire hazard. Bookshelves with classics lined the living room, which was full of coffee and end tables overflowing with copies of Time, Newsweek, and The New Yorker.  I was an avid reader (my dad used to bring me Pauline Kael movie reviews to read of films I was far too young to attend).  I may have perused a profile of an anti-Vietnam war activist or a review of a Miles Davis record in Playboy before finding the centerfold.

In the following weeks and months (and years and decades), it was made clear to me that my perspective was not widely shared. The mainstream view was that Miss December and her successors were weak, not strong.  I found a few exceptions like the work of Helmut Newton or Veruschka that kept me believing, but it was an argument that didn't seem worth the effort. So, I silently admired the poise and flamboyance in the models of Playboy and a newcomer named Penthouse.

In my early adult years, living in New York City and working as a journalist and cheesemonger, the fitness boom hit. Suddenly, millions of women took to the streets in leggings and sport bra combos and a few bold souls even adopted unitards as their daily garb. Their confidence and casual authority were inspiring.

I immediately saw the parallels to my magazine idols –these women believed in themselves and refused to let societal restrictions define them.  But there was a key difference.  Whereas a male nude might be viewed as predatory, a man in leggings or a unitard, was simply choosing to play on the tougher side of the bracket so to speak.

At long last, I escaped the nerdist prison of my youth and became a fitness buff. The gym or yoga studio was a daily stop on my itinerary, and a bicycle became my primary form of transportation.  In the process, I scrapped my jeans and t-shirts for many varieties of Lycra wear, and if queried, I'd tell people that women were strong in many ways that men should emulate.

And many men got it!  One night biking home from my retail job, wearing a Nike maroon unitard with a cool set of stripes down the side, a pair of young men catcalled me as I waited at a stop light.  When they realized that I was a guy, they recoiled. I balanced the dialogue by telling them that I didn’t think of being thought of as either female or gay was an insult, just inaccurate. Before we parted ways, one of them told me, “you have a bad ass and an even more badassed outfit.” I smiled and pedaled away.

In the early 2000s, I was physically self-confident enough to abandon jeans and make my primary wardrobe leggings and catsuits.  The one by Jean Paul Gaultier I reserved for special occasions.

 The author resplendent in his Gaultier garb (2002)

That was a comfortable plateau, but about 10 years ago, just as my fitness devotion was starting to wane, I stumbled upon a new level of inspiration while perusing social media.

Women like Laetitia, Liz Crosby, Fanny Muller, Jasmin Rituper, Poppyseed Dancer, and the fitness trainers of the AudriAsana.com crowd, especially Michelle Hanson and Rhyanna Watson, presented powerful representation of my original belief that a nude woman is like Michelangelo's David, the embodiment of courage and confidence.

Their photos were nudes in nature, in urban spaces, and of course in dancerly and yogic poses.  Most of these women were already in middle age, and happily debunking stereotypes.  The comment sections, rather than a cesspool of negativity, were full of praise, compliments and awe, many if not mostly from men who clearly identified with rather than objectified the women.

The timing couldn't have been better. Due to the vagaries of age (ouchies and minor injuries) and an overloaded work schedule, I had fallen off the fitness wagon.  The presence and poise these women possessed reminded me of why the gym and yoga mat had been my happy place. I began to build a routine again imagining that I was honoring my inner Jasmin or inner Michelle or other inspirations.  I even pitched a memoir  about it, but literary agents missed the point, which reinforced my belief that these bold souls were still ahead of their time.

Nevertheless, the path toward enlightenment and possibly happiness seemed clear and accessible again. It was reinforced two summers ago, when both of my roommates went away for a month.  My apartment became a clothing optional zone, and I experienced the enormous self-validation that comes from allowing your body to interact with the surrounding environment. I began to aspire to nude fitness and even vacations. And more importantly, I became completely convinced that my  9-year-old self was right after all.

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Martin Johnson has been a New York-based freelance writer since 1984. During that time, his work has appeared in the New York Times, New York Magazine, Rolling Stone and many other publications and websites. He presently writes regularly for the Wall Street Journal and NPR’s “Fresh Air.”  He also manages 67Gourmet, a cheese-and-specialty grocery shop in Manhattan.