I'd say skin as white as snow is a perfectly fitting description in my case. I don't think I ever truly understood the depth of my paleness until I got to high school, when it started to become noticeable that I was actually comparable to Casper the friendly ghost. I mean, at this point, it's not even an insult anymore and I've learned to just go with it. I'm honestly confused why I'm the only one in my family who didn't get the Hungarian gene to easily tan in the sun. Instead, I got the gene that leads to severe sun poisoning if I'm out in the open for too long. No joke, I'm 99% positive I'm actually allergic to the sun.
For any other human that's been blessed (sarcastic undertone) to have the palest skin, I'm sure we can relate on a multitude of life situations. Don't you just love when you go to buy new makeup, especially foundation, and you know immediately that your shade is going to be the one all the way to the left, usually labeled fair/pale, as if I didn't already know. My favorite thing is when somebody asks me, "Hey are you feeling okay?" Why yes, I'm feeling absolutely fantastic actually, I apologize for the unfortunate pastiness and sometimes sickly look of my skin. When you're as pale as I am, you learn a couple things about taking care of your skin. I, on most occasions during the warmer months, sometimes in the fall too, always carry sunblock with me. It just makes things easier when you're with a friend and you know for a fact that they don't use it unless they go to the beach. Personally, I like to wear moisturizer with SPF already in it so it makes my life ten times simpler.
That's another thing, the beach. Unless I'm wearing the highest possible SPF known to man, the beach means my butt is going to be sitting right under a nice shady umbrella. It's unfortunate, because I do really love the beach and sometimes a little lobster burn is totally worth it! (As long as you own some very powerful aloe vera gel).
So quick funny story, my senior year of high school (I'm about to be a junior in college currently) I decided that I should experiment with a spray tan for prom. This was mostly because my dress happened to be a skin color-like shade and I figured a tan would take it right over the top. So just to be safe, I did it two weeks before prom to see if I liked it. I'm chuckling to myself as I write this. Please don't waste time on spray tans, unless they truly, truly work for you. Holy crap. When I tell you I was unrecognizable, I'm not exaggerating. And then the best part was when the tan started spotting right around prom time. I realized that my pasty skin actually suited me best.
But in all honestly, jokes aside, I've learned to love my skin and all it's flaws, as everybody should. It's what makes you who you are, and that's always something to be proud of. I know when I was younger it made me feel insecure, but I've learned to embrace it and use it as my own personal inside joke. Sometimes being very pale has it's perks (please let me know when you discover one), I mean I came up with the idea to write this article as I was sitting poolside, in the shade of course, thinking to myself, "Well crap, I must look like a freaking vampire to some people I'm so pale."
