STRANGER THAN FICTION: AN ORANGE TAN IS BETTER THAN NO TAN AT ALL

Is everybody else noticing these beautiful women with gorgeous tans all over Cape Girardeau?

I'm skeptical. Tans don't come easy here in the Midwest unless you're a construction worker or homeless. Otherwise, catching rays for a few hours on the weekends doesn't get you that deep, dark, savage tan.

Which means only one thing: These ladies are hitting the tanning beds.

Who can blame them? Tanning beds are relaxing. Dark skin -- but not that leather-bag style so many embrace -- looks better than paper white. It's getting hotter, and a nice tan can take the place of sticky, binding pantyhose.

And, despite all the scientific evidence that too much time in the sun will lead to wrinkles and skin cancer, whiteness simply is not catching on in this community. I've seen only one Goth in the nine months since my return from Florida, and he was in Denny's at 1 a.m. eating pancakes, not parading around the city, drawing envious stares from passers-by.

But tanning beds aren't an option for me. I'm picturing one of two embarrassing scenarios.

In the first, I strip off my clothes and lie down. The lid won't close over my gut. Hearing my grunts as I struggle to close it, a helpful attendant believes me to be in trouble and rushes in, only to turn around yelling, "My eyes! They burn!" She becomes anorexic.

In the second, I strip off my clothes, sit down and go crashing through the clear plate between me and the bulbs, causing an electrical disturbance. Cape Girardeau experiences a three-day blackout. Doctors spend the next several weeks picking glass splinters out of my butt.

In short, I bought some tanning lotion at an upscale department store. None of that cheap drugstore stuff for a task this serious.

I felt a little smug Sunday night while reading the package directions, which assured me that I was making the best choice for a healthy tan. I exfoliated. I carefully applied the lotion in horizontal and then vertical strokes, just like the directions said. I stood around nude for half an hour before dressing, congratulating myself for picking a product not as smelly as some.

It didn't seem to be working. I went to bed.

The smell woke me up in about three hours -- a chemical stench that almost resembled burning flesh. My skin was darker, even a little orange.

And I realized the lotion had clumped up on my right wrist and on the back of my left ankle. Re-exfoliating those areas didn't help, although a bath temporarily washed away the stink. (I can still smell it if I press my arm to my nose. Luckily, not many people sniff my arms.)

My cousin-in-law Ashley saw the results on Monday.

"People will probably think that thing on your wrist is a birthmark," she said helpfully.

The saddest part is that, while slightly orange and sporting birthmark-like clumps of tanning lotion, I am more happy with my appearance than when I'm white as a sheet. And I figure I can keep the stench at bay with scented body spray.

This clearly is a mental disorder.

I blame the media.

Heidi Hall is managing editor of the Southeast Missourian.