There comes a day at the end of spring when the temperature rises above 72 degrees and we—fueled by blind optimism and seasonal amnesia—decide it’s time to put on…shorts.
It starts innocently enough. You open your closet, see them folded there, beckoning for you to come closer. You think: Today’s the day. Your brain has erased the trauma of years of hot and humid summers past. You’ve forgotten the reality of sitting on hot car seats and the existential horror of exposed kneecaps that now look like worried emojis.
You shimmy into your shorts like a baby deer on roller skates—off balance, slightly panicked, but determined. And then you catch a glimpse of your legs.
No warning.
No time to brace.
Just full exposure.
Legs that haven’t seen sunlight since October. Skin so blindingly pale it’s not even white—it’s moonbeam beige. Birds scatter. Clouds part. NASA adjusts satellite angles. Somewhere, a child asks if ghosts are real.
But you’re in too deep now. You’ve committed. You lather on sunscreen like you’re frosting a cake. You leave the house, legs out, the wind smacking your knees like you owe it money.
Then it happens: you sit down. Somewhere public. And suddenly you remember that shorts, though cooler in general, have no mercy when it comes to riding up, scrunching weirdly, or doing that thing where they wedge into places you didn’t authorize.
But ladies, this is the initiation. The hazing ritual of summer. The awkward, unflattering, slightly clammy truth we all face before the tan sets in, before we remember to hydrate, before we find the good pair of shorts that don’t betray us every time we walk upstairs.
So, raise a glass of something to everyone out there rocking their awkward first-shorts-of-the-season day. You’re doing amazing, sweetie. (Blinding, but amazing.)
And if anyone stares? Just tell them your legs are solar-powered.
It’s summer, baby. We have waited a long time for this day! Let the cellulite shine and the vitamin D do its thing.
May your sunscreen be strong, and your shorts stay out of places they don’t belong.
