No sooner have I mentioned ‘things I’d like to see in SL naturism’ and ‘I need to do more with the Moonella Group’ than a couple of creations, courtesy of SLN publisher Howie, turn up.
‘Share them around the group for free’, he says.
‘Yep! I stole it in Spain’
And now it’s on the wall of my house!
‘Where’s my ladder? Where’s my electric drill?’ asks Howie
His signs, a no-swimwear sign, and a ‘Zona Naturista’ sign (shamelessly stolen from Vera Playa, Spain) will be offered as free gifts to those of you in the Moonella Group in the next 24 hours.
Howie, like me, is a Vera Playa user (or has been in the past). Both signs are now attached to the wall of his apartment in Eden, and certainly lay claim to the policies in play if you land there.
This time tomorrow, I hope to have both signs offered up as gifts via the Moonella Group.
Where’s Barbara? A long-time, if irregular, contributor to SL Naturist, you may have asked yourself where she’s been. Has she given up blogging for us?
The answer is ‘no’. Barbara has been busy out there in real life, learning new skills that she thought that might have a benefit for the blog in the longer term.
I’ll let Barbara take up the story…
‘Being an older person, and utilising an avatar that reflects my real life condition, I’d generally played SL while nursing a terminally ill husband and occasionally blogged for Ella on naturist issues that might be more reflective of the older person, whether in a naturist environment or not. When my husband finally passed away I found myself at a loose end, and after a while came to realise I needed to fill the void with some new skills. To begin with, I’m not old enough to retire just yet, and I felt I needed some extra work skills to assist me get back into the employment marketplace. I’m pleased to say that I am working again, but as anyone who has changed jobs knows, it takes a bit of time learning the ropes and the politics of the workplace, which is why I’ve not been around much in recent months.
‘I’m finally coming to terms with the major upheavals in my life, and I purchased a new computer, a Mac, sometime back, and I’ve sat at nights learning new skills on it, as well as attending night classes on which to learn further computer skills. I’ve begun to slip back into SL with some regularity recently. With the term at night class having ended for the Christmas holidays, I spent a while, last week, giving my avatar a makeover. During this trawl around the grid, looking for bargains, I found a photo studio that included some dance animations, and I had a ‘Eureka!’ moment.
‘Remember that ‘Eureka!’ moments generally include a bit of nudity, hahaha, coming from Ancient Greek, and attributed to Archimedes. It means ‘I’ve found it!’ (the answer). In Archimedes’ case, that was about the displacement of water in his bath as he stepped into it, the water rising as a result. He was so enthusiastic to spread this discovery that he is alleged to have run through the streets of Syracuse naked.
‘My ‘Eureka’ moment was the realisation that I could make a video of this dance, and it could be uploaded. I sent it to Ella, and we’ve spent the last week or so discussing how it might be applied to SL Naturist. I’ll hand back to Ella to tell you more’.
….as a result of that conversation with Barbara, and others involved in SL Naturist, we’ve decided to set up our own ‘film unit’. Previously on SLN I’ve pointed you in the direction of, for example, Naturisme TV, where key naturist locations around France are highlighted in a monthly ‘travelogue’ film unique to the internet. The internet is also full of short advertisements for the delights of various naturist locations around the globe. So why not do the same in the context of SL?
So that’s what we’re going to do, on an irregular (for now) basis. I’m not particularly skilled in this sort of thing, so Barbara, Apricot and Mr. Keng will be doing the vast majority of the ‘video’ stuff. My role will be confined, as far as I know (and hope) to doing a bit of presenting for it.
Now you know why we stepped into a couple of seemingly ‘cul de sacs’ last week. Be honest: you thought that videos of Bruno Mars, or Mr. Keng’s makeover, were may just a little bit irrelevant? No, on the contrary, they were experiments to see if we could imbed videos, for Mr. Keng to look presentable if he’s going to be in world more as a result. It was a bit of a means to an end, and as I don’t have the facilities to do these in a ‘ghost’ blog, they had to be tried here and made to look relevant to SLN, even if it was a tight fit.
I have to say that the project is quite exciting. I’m not sure how it will develop, but I’m confident it’s going to add just a little extra to SLN in 2015. No, there won’t be full feature-length movies, and we’re also not quite sure how we’ll add ‘dialogue’, in text form? Using our own voices? but I do hope we can make SL seem a little bit more ‘alive’ with this approach.
What’s that? You’d like to see Barbara’s initial experiment with SL moving image, the silent, short clip that may open up a new area of exploration for SLN? Sure…you got it!
We’ve opened up our own youtube channel. I’ll keep you updated as and when new videos arrive, and they’ll all be available from that source (and maybe others) in the future.
My function, as editor of SLN, has sometimes been to explore avenues I’d previously been unaware of. I’ve written, before, how I’m not overly excited by nudist websites where photographs are the focus.
To me, the textual content of a website is the primary source of interest. Thus: you’ve been to Koversada in Croatia…tell me what restaurants I should try. What’s worth seeing in the area? Even if it means putting on stupid clothes in that heat.
But I’ve been recently going around numerous tumblr websites dedicated to ‘the nudist’ on the basis that they inform my decisions regarding SLN. If ‘body painting’ seems to be a thing in real life naturism, shouldn’t we cover that? If pubic hair, circumcision, genital piercings, swingers or anything else are vexing RL naturists, shouldn’t SL naturism reflect that? Well, of course.
What I see on those websites do have an impact on what SLN covers.
So here’s the deal. You look at a tumblr archive. What’s the deal, in this context?
What do you see? Tits? Cocks? Shaved? Unshaved? Big cocks? Small cocks? Big tits? Small tits? Shaved? Hairy? Fat? Thin? Gay? Straight? Black? White?
You’ve got it. Eventually it all bends into one, and the focus goes back on ‘people’, not their generally accepted ‘private’ parts. Eventually, you’re thinking ‘that’s a gorgeous beach, where is it?’
Eventually you’re thinking ‘I need to think about booking holiday there, wherever it is’.
We become more than the total of our genitalia.
Congratulations. You’ve ceased to think like someone surfing ‘porn’ and begun to think like a true naturist. It’s only when you look at it in a ‘tumblr archive’ way that the idea of ‘naked’ and ‘private parts’ slips away to become ‘people’. And real life naturism is like that. Eventually ( not a long period of time from your debut. An hour? Two hours?) you’ve stopped even thinking of people as being naked. You’ve begun to see them as people.
Admit it. You’ve stopped looking at the photos -too much to focus on- and begun to look at the words -what people are saying.
That’s just what RL naturism is about. Judging people according to their words, their personality, not how big a cock or tits they have.
If you’ve not experienced RL naturism then look at the photos above for a second, then look away. Can you describe anyone in the photos? No. It fades into one large mass.
And the RL naturist beach is like that. You aren’t focussing on an individual. You can’t think of an individual. Some are bigger, smaller, younger, older, more tanned, less tanned than their neighbour. In conversation, you’ll focus on what they say, not how they look. Reflect, too, on whether any individual in the photos might look back at you. No, you aren’t that beautiful, attractive, gorgeous. You’re a human being with bits in the right places.
So what are you waiting for? 2015 is the year you’re embracing naturism. 2015 is the year when you cast off the ill-judged concerns of textilism.
the sl naturist 