The Devil’s Last Preserve
We were born to dance naked in the woods.
This past weekend me and Rachel went upstate to work on a new project. We rented an Airbnb that we selected because it like where Taylor Swift recorded “evermore.”
Going upstate this time of year reminds me of all the time I spent visiting a horse ranch with my family as a kid. The place where I mythologically grew up. I ran wild with freedom I was never granted in suburbia: traveling through gated-in woods and riding trained horses in loops. I felt free.
The cabin we booked had everything you’d expect: a big spider in my room that caused me to move out, black wasps in the living room we asked the owner to kill for us string lights that we kept on all night in case intruders approached us in the dark, and a private pond on premise.
There was a sign next to the pond that encouraged skinny dipping and for 24 hours all I genuinely did was talk about how I wanted to swim naked in it. I’ve never skinny-dipped before but it’s been something I’ve NEEDED to do since seeing Call Me By Your Name. Living in Brooklyn, especially as winter approaches, I feared this would be one of my only chances to try whatever vanilla version of exhibitionism my instincts were so clearly tugging me toward.
Plus I wanted to post a thotty-yet-funny picture of my ass to Instagram. I’ve been talking about this a lot on the podcast. My “nude-obsession” and how I want to find an outlet to share this VERY ARTISTIC photography. I figured this lake was the perfect opportunity to do so. It was warm for November so it wasn’t the craziest idea.
But ponds scare me because of the risk of flesh eating bacteria and mossy rocks touching my toes. Plus the water was cold and filled with fish that were a little too eager to take nips at my finger when I dipped it in the water— which didn’t bode well for my entire naked body. I decided against it. I would have other opportunities to swim naked in a body of water (preferably a pool) down the line.
Still, unable to say no to my impulses, I searched for answers online to mitigate my pond-anxiety. I learned you could gets strep throat or a UTI or maybe a worse disease that could lead to death down the line from a pond but honestly that’s the same risk as having sex with a man so it quelled a portion of my hesitation.
Ultimately, I decided I didn’t need to commit to the pond in its entirety. I forgot I could dip a toe into the water before I decided if it was for me instead of throwing my entire person into the center of it (I have the same issue with dating).
So, in broad daylight, I stepped outside of the cabin, dropped my shorts, and walked to the water.
At first I had this weird shame like I was doing something perverted and wrong and got scared someone might see me. I surveyed the area twice before I let the guilt subside. I reminded myself of the sign next to the pond, the encouragement to be naked in this space. I walked toward the mossy bank of the pond speckled with smooth slabs of rock someone laid down to simulate stairs.
I stood there surrounded by the world. And the world didn’t give a fuck.
The trees kept on creaking against each other, the wind kept on howling through the cabin’s shutters, the squirrels kept digging pits to store acorns for the winter. The forest wasn’t interested in me or my nakedness, I was just another living being inside of it. Instead of a visitor to the land, I was a part of it, just as integral as the pond or the trees or the mountains they were growing out of.
For a second I was nothing and everything all at once.
I’ve been really online lately and a lot of my most important life updates have stemmed from and have been celebrated through the internet. My career has always been contingent upon it, now more than ever.
As I stood there with the wind on my hole I saw a world where I forgot about all of it:
The TikTok comments and the Instagram DMs and the Scruff messages and the work emails and the Citizen alerts and the Twitter drama and the album streams and the podcast downloads. Everything that wasn’t right there, right then.
I was just another naked animal in the woods.
Maybe that’s why Abigail Williams took off her bonnet and dress and danced under the full moon. We came from this. The primal urge to feel the earth crunch under your feet and the air blow between your legs. Maybe Abigail was called back to herself, despite the puritanical restrictions she was forced to exist underneath. A lot of the times I forget Abigail was ever a real person. I still feel sorry for her. And I still think about her a lot.
That moment reminded me of both my insignificance and my power on this planet. In the past 26 years, I’ve labeled myself as nearly everything you could possibly label yourself. I was a vegetarian for six years, I was bisexual for a few months, I thought I was nonbinary until I did shrooms, I thought was a republican in 5th grade (cancel me). Gay. Writer. Podcaster. Brooklynite. Leo Sun, Pisces Moon, Libra Rising. INTJ. Swiftie. Social Media Manager. Agnostic-ish. Repressed. Traumatized. Insecure. Stupid. Scared.
But in that moment I was simply a beast. A beast with a beard and hair that travels around its shoulders and down its chest. Standing on two legs, staring out at the woods, relentlessly searching for safety, constantly redefining the thing it calls home.
I never tried the water. I took my most candid-looking pictures, put back on my clothes, and returned to the cabin and then returned to Brooklyn.
I’ve been thinking about it ever since.
i can't wait for your autobiography in 2 decades. the way you is just something you cannot teach.