Wearing a two-piece means you're never alone

S. and I went bikini-shopping yesterday in the ATL. We're headed back to the beach in about 2 weeks, and it's a co-ed trip this time, so we decided we each needed a decent bathing suit to at least lure our guy friends into a sense of security and well-being until our less-clean beachy selves emerged and replaced the nicely-groomed beach gals with the silent, blissed out, showering-optional, floating hippos who only emerge from the shallows to demand a cold drink.

This kind of shopping is a huge bonding experience. I've known this woman for 15 years, and we've never shopped for bathing suits together. We both confessed after the first store that we'd never shopped with another person for this particular article. This is how stupid bikinis can make women. S. is like an icon of womanhood--she's built like Rita Hayworth. She's hot, people. Hot. I'm not 23 anymore, but I'm doing ok, too. But we were both sick to our stomachs about shopping for a damn bikini.

What's particularly telling about this to me is that I have always felt this way. I was 18 and hot as hell (I realize this only now) and I agonized over needing a new suit. I didn't wear a string bikini until I was in my mid-20s and my then-boyfriend made me buy one for a trip.

Why is this? Why do we hate shopping for something that produces happiness? At first I thought it was the mirrors in the dressing rooms. I'll get to the pool and be reasonably fine with whatever I'm wearing. I'll get to the beach and be completely ok whether I'm wearing a muumuu or a thong. It's just those closed rooms and that bright light and being faced with a body that is often resistant to our desires. At the first store, when we were in our separate dressing rooms, there was a strange silence. S. noted later that those quiet minutes were likely the longest we'd gone without speaking in decades. After the hush became unbearable, S. finally called out, "You ok?" I grunted through a side-tie untangling and said, "Well, my spirit's not quite broken yet."

The dressing room theory evolved when we ended up at Loehmann's in the communal dressing room. This is not for everyone, but it's an experience that makes you leave your shame or embarrassment at the door. It's nothing but women in various states of undress, all shapes, sizes, and ages, and a woman I've always thought of as "matron" who happily comments on what you're wearing and whether it's working. The other women all encourage each other or say things like "no no no the other one was much better."

I've come to believe that it's not the mirrors or the light in those dressing rooms that can make you sad--you get a multiple reflection of your bare ass in a whole new way at Loehmann's--I think it's the fact that you're alone. At least in my case, the experience of going one on one with a full-length mirror and a pale bod in a bikini can make you can completely lose sight of the fact that you look fine. All you see in the dressing room is a body without airbrushing, one that does not look like the woman in the magazines. Only when you're naked with a bunch of other women (and I am laughing as I write this because it sounds like baaaaad porn) can you recall, "Oh, damn! We all look like this! We're all fine! And I'm going to the beach, baby!!"