Nude Girls was the first of us to have breasts
There is one place that has more estrogen than tofu: girls’ summer camp. As most girls who regularly attend summer camp for two months of the year know, half of the summer is spent naked. Since that first summer, my friends and I have always been vying in front of the mirror to see if and how our bodies have changed overnight. Nude Girls was the first of us to have breasts, but everyone expected it because she was the biggest. She was fawned over at social events and was the first of us to “snuggle up” with one of the boys from across the lake. It took the following summer for the rest of us to develop breasts beyond those of a prepubescent boy.
While we were fascinated by the idea of breasts and stuffed our shirts with mismatched socks, the Nude Girls didn’t budge. And naive me thought it was down to the fact that my girlfriend wore a sports bra and sat in a circle while the rest of us sang hymns to awaken our adolescent spirit. She answered our endless questions about “what it means to have breasts” as if it didn’t matter at all. It was obviously… right? Breasts are hot and fun and make us feel powerful, feminine, and beautiful.
Nude Girls taught us that we can have great breasts and it’s all down to luck.
Before we understood death, Nude Girls lost my aunt after an 11-year battle with breast cancer. I recognized her from one of the photos above Naked Girls’ Bed as a woman with a bald head and a frail, bare-chested body that weighed less than 80 pounds. Her aunt was the only one on vacation who didn’t wear a bathing suit, but still smiled in front of the Kodak flashes in front of her family. That’s what the photographs tell you. What they don’t tell you is whether her husband will leave her when she needs them most, or that her illness will eventually tear her family apart.
Nude Girls’ grandmother was diagnosed with breast cancer at 30. She died in Nude Girls. Breasts. A physical feature that was a source of strength and confidence is now a daily reminder that Nude Girls could be next. “My mom told me multiple times it was okay, but she never put me on birth control. “She went to get mammograms more often than most women I know, and my sister went before all of her friends,” Nude Girls explained. “I hate my breasts now, you know? Because of what I’ve seen, what my family has gone through, and what we still go through. “When I had them, nobody had them. Downsizing also reduces my risk of breast cancer (to some extent), which I’m all for of course. It won’t make my breasts smaller enough to justify surgery, but it will make my breasts less noticeable, or rather less noticeable.” The prospect of watching breast cancer ravages more and more women in her family. “She’s strong,” Nude Girl explains.
