Roger Rabbits with Jim Bunny

“Good ideas are always crazy...until they’re not.”

Thanks Elon. I take a billionaire’s wisdom on board. But my latest idea is going to stay crazy. It’s never going to not be crazy. But let’s fly with it anyway. See where it takes us.

I suggested to dearest Doe that we have an adventure this Christmas; do something bold, something daredevil, that we go where rabbits have never dared hop. Or bound. Or burrow.

“A cruise. A Caribbean cruise. But not just any Caribbean cruise.”

The Doe’s visualising a balmy tropical escape and sparkling turquoise seas. I am thinking jerk chicken and Aruba Ariba rum punch. Perhaps cricket at Sabina Park. “And shopping, lots of new clothes,” she says.

Well, probably not. That’s where we can make some serious savings. You might not even need to pack a bag.

“Sorry?”

“It’s a NUDE cruise. Advertised at the weekend. Get the kit off for an 11-day high seas excursion dubbed the 2025 Big Nude Boat. The Bahamas, San Juan, Puerto Rico, St. Lucia. All in the buff. ”

Sun, sea, exotic stopovers and not a stitch. Fine food, shows, cocktails and not one worry about what to wear.

Why?

It’s a new cruise out of Port Miami – shipboard bollocky.

But my pitch took off like another ‘crazy idea’, Elon’s SpaceX rocket – soared briefly then nose-dived, exploding in flames on impact.

“Why?” asked the Doe in disbelief. “Why a nude cruise?”

Of course, I rationalised, it’s a statement against ‘clothingism’ and ‘textilism’ – all those false teachings that clothes are better than God’s own design. The way we were born.

“Why?” she insisted.

Because it would beat another 10 days spent cheek to jowl at the Mount camping ground, or playing spot the open shop on Devonport Rd, or dodgems on Cameron Rd.

The Doe wasn’t taking this well. To be expected really, because we’re both lights out, curtains drawn sorts of Presbyterian people. We do prudish very well.

Happier

But as I explained, stripping back to what God gave you may be all we need to be happier, and in turn, healthier. Studies find that by simply spending more time naked, we can increase our body image, self-esteem, and life satisfaction.

And you can do it in the Caribbean with a daiquiri in one hand, sunscreen in the other and not one shred of ‘textile’ between you and the high seas. Not one!

History tells us there’s virtue and nobility in nudity. Lady Godiva weaponised nakedness, riding naked through the streets of Coventry to protest the oppressive taxes imposed by her husband. He knew the value of a shilling but nothing about the will of a woman.

US founding father Benjamin Franklin is often touted by the naturists. He would often slip out of his dark velvet waistcoat and breeches and sit naked in front of an open window. An “air bath” he called it. He was short and corpulent so it wouldn’t have been pretty. He was also an eccentric genius, probably did some of his best work butt naked.

Legend has it Winston Churchill once received ‘FDR’ while “stark naked and gleaming pink from his bath”. And US president John Quincy Adams, often bathed nude in Potomac River.

I sense the Doe is still ambivalent. “Why are we even discussing taking our clothes off in front of 2500 people on a ship?”
Well, for nudists, being naked is a way of life. They believe the human body is natural and beautiful; and that clothing is a societal construct that can be restrictive, uncomfortable and unnecessary.

Cue sighs and rolling eyes because the Doe is an entrenched ‘textile’. “Clothing is a necessary part of whom I am and my everyday life. My clothes are important for my protection, my modesty and my style. I follow social norms and dress codes and I would feel uncomfortable or embarrassed being naked in public.”

Pocket person

And she’s a pocket person.  “I have pockets everywhere, in everything – for hands, for car keys, phone, gum, purse, tissues. Where would I put my lip gloss? Where would I put everything required to make this human function? I will not have my pockets stripped away for some frivolous, crazy idea. I refuse to clamp my $1500 iPhone 14 between my butt cheeks so my hands are free to drink dry martinis naked with the captain of the Big Nude Boat.”

And, she added, vehemently, what about the whackos, the pervs?

None of that…uh-uh!

They’re naturists, nudists, purists aboard the Big Nude Boat. They’re not kinky, hedonistic adventurers. Not where we’re going.

Where we WERE going. Because this little naked Christmas escapade has been scuttled, sunk, before it even slipped its moorings.