Pomegranates. The episode started with pomegranates. Pomegranates didn't cause the episode, they were just there when it began. And it was this episode that made me committed to opening a blog about the entire LAGNAP movement, small and private though it might be.
So, what about pomegranates? Well, I have always loved the fruit. I seldom have more than one a year and often go several years between enjoying this unique fruit. But I love them. In Texas, the fruit is found almost exclusively between November and February. But just every once in awhile, we will get a batch or two from some southern hemisphere source such as Chile.
It was late June and I was at our local grocery store chain, AGB, looking at the pomegranates and considering buying a couple. I was so absorbed in the consideration, that my normal situational awareness was far below standard and I was shocked when I heard a voice matter-of-factly utter "I've seen you naked a lot."
My neck nearly broke as I twisted to find the source of this rifle-shot like greeting. At first, I did not recognize the speaker out of context, but eventually I came to the knowledge that this was my neighbor on the side we never spoke or interacted with. I couldn't as quickly recall her name, but I am sure my eyes betrayed equal amount of recognition and fear simultaneously.
In any event, my fears were squelched when she quickly added, "It's OK, I'm not mad or threatening you, or anything. I'd like to talk for just a moment if you can?"
We went over to the area where AGB sells sodas and coffee and i bought us both a soda so we could sit in the little cafe area and chat. I was way beyond curious about what this was moving toward. I had started out afraid she was going to call me a pervert, freak, or sex fiend, but now I felt it was not that at all. My wife and I use our backyard, patio, and pool in the nude quite often, and this was the first time I had ever had evidence that we might have been observed.
By now, I had clearly remembered her name and I opened the chat "Clara, you surprised me, and at first even scared me. But now I am just super-curious. What's happening here?"
Clara Roberts, our neighbor on the sad side of our home, was one we almost never saw and never spoke with - not once in more than every three years or so. We didn't really know either of them, Clara or Karl, and we didn't know why we didn't know them. They seemed stand-offish to all the neighbors. Their house seemed hermetically sealed, so to speak. Their yard was a horror. The times he came out to weed-whack (they had no lawn to mow) every couple of months, he did so in a manner that made you think he was walking on the surface of Mars and eager to get back inside for his very survival. And here I was sitting at a small cafe table with Clara, sans Karl, because she had told me she had seen me naked.
Clara paused, and then shared "You do have a very private back yard, but there are a couple of places, where I can see certain areas of your yard, and I know that you and your wife are plainly nudists." She shifted in her seat. Nobody could hear or overhear us, but she shifted her voice nearer to a whisper ... "And I want you to teach me to be a nudist, also."
I now had to pause. I was not sure what my response would or should be, but soon I realized that I had multiple responses and just started placing them out there. "Well, I can't do anything without including my wife." Time for a breath. "There is nothing really to 'teach' about getting nude, you just get nude." Another. "I don't know how to start, or carry on with teaching someone to be a nudist." Yet another breath. "What about Karl, where does he fit in this?"
Clara seemed prepared for a flurry of questions and she very coolly and calmly responded "Look, we don't need to do all this here. Let me invite myself over to your house in an hour so you can prepare your wife and we can talk in privacy. But we WILL talk, OK? Remember, I have seen you guys naked, so it is not about your modesty, it is about me wanting to learn to be a nudist."
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