Waiting Woman

I had decided that this conference’s naked photo should be of a man, just to help even out the gender imbalance. My friend Philadelphia Guy is having a great year — he got engaged to the woman of his dreams and then got a book contract soon after. I knew he’d be easy. Other male friends, when we talked about the naked blogging project, nodded and said, “Sure, I’ll pose.”

So the men did offer this year. Really, they did.

But actually taking the photo proved to be difficult. I wanted natural light, but our daytimes were packed with back-to-back sessions. I did carry my camera to sessions one day, offering to snap the photo out in the hallway, but my friends seemed to think I was joking when I asked them to strip amongst their laptop-carrying, coffee-drinking colleagues.

On Saturday, I returned to my room for a short break before the business luncheon, and found my roommate there, preparing what she needed to bring to the lunch. We began talking about the similarities in our lives. We both have sons who are seniors in high school, who will be going onto college next year. We have elderly family members — my mother-in-law and her mother — entering the last stages of their life.

“It’s a liminal stage,” she said.

“We’re both such caretakers,” I said to her. “I wonder what the next stage of life will be like.”

As we talked, I noticed that diffuse light coming through the window, striking her dark hair, and I said, abruptly, “Hey! Can I take a naked photo of you?”

I couldn’t remember, actually, whether or not I’d told her about the project, but I figured she might have heard about it from someone else. It’s a small conference. Word gets around.

“You get to choose your own pseudonym,” I said by way of a bribe.

She laughed. I took that as consent and jumped up to get my camera. She stripped her clothes off.

“I’ve thought of a pseudonym,” she said as she sat back down in the chair. “How about Waiting Woman?”

I snapped the photo. “That’s perfect,” I said. “Waiting describes this stage of life, but it’s also a verb – you’re always waiting on people.”

She nodded. “Exactly.”



(Readers who want the history of the naked photo tradition can check it out here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and  here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here.)