First Sun

Diana and her mom are sun people. They like nothing better than to spend a week basting under the blazing hot sun and turning a dark shade of maroon. I, on the other hand, fall more in the Mole People camp. I fear the sun. And once a year a team of dermatologists carve out huge chunks of sun damaged skin from my body, leaving me resembling a nice piece of swiss cheese.

Unfortunately, Elijah inherited my Mole Man genes.

Every time we took Eli out to our Mexican pool, he’d squint painfully at the giant fiery orb in the sky and recoil in terror. It makes sense. Most of his life, he’s experienced a grey, gloomy Evanston sky. Imagine your first true experience with a sunny day being practically on the surface of the sun. Yeah yeah, anyone with a calendar knows that Eli was born in April and did have an official summer, but those first couple months he was just trying to stay alive, not experience a Beach Boys song.

Here’s the thing. If avoiding the sun is your goal, Mexico is the last place on Earth you want to be. Even inside our nice, cool condo the sun beat down from every angle. Eli would restrict his playtime to the two inches of shade he was given.

Luckily, Diana came equipped with so much sun protection for him that he came home whiter than when he left. We had hats. We had UV protected shirts. We had SPF 50 covering his whole body.

Next year we’re going to vacation in an igloo.