There's a clothing-optional beach in Toronto called Hanlan's Point – actually, it's across the lake, on the Toronto Islands. It's one of only two officially recognized nude beaches in all of Canada, apparently. And somehow, until last week, I had never gone.
Oh, don't worry, I definitely knew about it. I've been invited, on several occasions, to go there for beachside birthday parties and summertime hangs with sex-positive friends. But I had never managed to actually go, and it's for a reason that's kind of embarrassing to admit: I was too nervous. But not about the nudity.
Being naked in public is no big deal to me, to be honest. Sure, it always feels weird for a few seconds when I first take off my clothes – say, when I'm about to get into the heated pool at my local sex club, or when I'm with a group of pals at Pride and we decide to walk around topless in the summer sun – but I quickly acclimate. Nude bodies are just bodies; they're not monstrous, or shocking, or worthy of judgment, as long as they're being displayed in appropriate settings. I've been going to events like all-nude Body Pride workshops and public porn shoots since I was 20, and I'm even more confident about my shape and size now than I was then. It no longer phases me to be naked in public (as long as I've consented to it and so have the people around me, obviously).
No, the thing that troubled me about visiting Hanlan's was much sillier. I was nervous about the travel. See, to get to the Islands, you have to take a ferry boat from a station at the southernmost part of the city. Because of the ways my anxiety manifests, the journey stressed me out on logistical and social levels. How would I know where to go? Would the ticket-takers look at me judgmentally, knowing I planned to strip nude on the other side of the ride? Would people think I was weird for taking the ferry alone, even if I was going to meet friends? How would I figure out when and where to actually get naked? Would people aggressively flirt with me, and if so, how would I fend them off? Did I need to bring a towel, a folding chair, a canister of pepper spray? What would I do if I needed to use the bathroom? And so on and so forth.
What usually helps me the most, when I have these types of anxieties about going to a new place, is having someone to go with. Ideally someone who's been there before, but that's not a requirement. It just needs to be someone who's confident and unafraid enough to lead the way into a new situation. And fortunately, last week my spouse was visiting me in Toronto and they wanted to go to the nude beach.
(I feel like a lot of people in my life, upon meeting my spouse, may assume that they're more buttoned-up than me, because they're relentlessly polite and because, well, I'm the sex writer in the relationship. But let the record show that mb is every bit as much of a sexual weirdo as I am, and sometimes even moreso, especially in cases like this one where the main barrier stopping me from flying my freak flag is sheer anxiety, of which mb blessedly has very little.)
My spouse is the type of person who likes to do a lot of research before going anywhere, which helps make the great unknown more knowable. They spent some time reading up on Hanlan's – its history, its rules, and how to get there – so they could convey that information to me and guide us there. And they did, buying us ferry tickets and leading me the whole way.
I felt very starry-eyed and in love; the whole afternoon was such a perfect example of why mb is the right person for me to be married to. In many ways they are an exact mirror image of me, strong where I am weak, curious where I am averse, brave where I am meek. (There are some situations in which I can be stronger or braver than them – don't worry, I'm not trying to trash-talk myself here – but visiting a nude beach on a separate land mass is not one of those.) I let them take me where I needed to go, like the headstrong daddy dom they are. It was nice.
The beach itself was nice too. Hot sun, hot sand. Blue water, blue sky. Breeze and birdsong and faraway murmurs of other visitors to this magical place. We laid down our towels, cast off our clothes and stretched out our limbs. We covered each other in sunscreen from head to toe, an act of love and protection. We donned sunglasses, bought cold drinks, and laid there each reading a book, separate but together, for a few hours.
The nudity was fine. That's not the important part. What matters is that I'm in love with mb because they're such a wonderful person and because they make me a better person – a better, braver, stronger, wilder and more worldly person. A person I want to be.