Hot Fun In the Summertime

When I was young we didn’t have sun screen or sun block. We had sun tan lotion, but that was meant only to minimize burns and help develop tans. It almost never worked to do either. The SPF was probably somewhere in the low single digits. We also didn’t have computers or computer games or video games or social media. For that matter we didn’t even have TV. There were only three TV stations and all they broadcasted during the days were soap operas. So I spent a great deal of my youth, especially through the summers, outdoors: playing baseball, playing golf, swimming, fishing in farm ponds with no shade. And I burned easily and often, my skin pale, my eyes blue. And I’m paying for it now.

For the past 20+ years I’ve been seeing a dermatologist regularly for actinic keratosis, small precancerous skin lesions that need to be burned off with liquid nitrogen before they grow into full-blown cancer. About 10 years ago, my doctor discovered a basal cell carcinoma, the most common non-melanoma cancer, on my upper arm and had to cut it out, cauterize it, and stitch it up. Today, he had to do the same for a squamous cell carcinoma, the second most common skin cancer, that had grown from an undetected actinic keratosis on my cheek. It’s minor surgery, done in-office, and the only pain is the needle injecting the local anesthesia (though the sizzle and smell of my burning flesh during the cauterizing of the wound is a tad disconcerting).

I’m one of those old farts who drive around during the summer feeling nostalgic and sad to see parks and playgrounds devoid of kids out playing baseball, soccer, basketball, kickball – anything. I’m pleased when I see pictures of my young grandkids out in the park on swings and slides or at the zoo or at the pool. But I also know now – as I hope they do – that there are dangers in that wonderful, warming sun, dangers that take years and decades to appear, and then more years and decades to play out.