Summertime's fun, but be safe in the sun

Post by Travis Andrews —

The summer’s hitting its stride, and the sun isn’t taking a break anytime soon.

And, as someone who is about as white as white gets, I can tell you that it can be a dangerous world out there. As patronizing as it might seem to write about being safe in the sun — something I imagine most people in the sun are already doing — I am going to do that very thing right now. Because, I guess, I need to follow my own advice.

Between trips to the beach, days spent with picnics on the Parade Ground and afternoons running around the LSU lakes, most students give themselves ample opportunity to be burned or poisoned by the sun.

This is not good.

And for more reasons than are obvious.

Of course there is the basic, unsightly and pretty painful aspect of receiving a sunburn, which appears as a blotchy red rash. In actuality, it is a burning of the skin caused by the greatest source of heat any human being will ever come into contact with.

In addition to the sunburns, we all — and by we all, I mean those who were cursed with having absolutely no pigment — have earned at one time in our life are the less common but still dangerous effects.

There is sun poisoning, which is exactly what it sounds like.

Accompanied with nausea, aches, cramps, pain, weakness and a nasty sunburn, it’s something worth avoiding.

And to all those runners taking a spin around the lakes during mid-day, be careful that your muscles are not overtraining. Your metabolism is running much faster than wintertime just trying to keep you cool. Not to mention all the liquid you are sweating out that needs to be replaced at some point.

Then there’s the big kahuna of sun problems: skin cancer.

It doesn’t feel like reality, at this young an age, that skin cancer could quickly and easily destroy a life. It seems almost absurd to think that hanging out and throwing a Frisbee could lead to a painful road.

But it can.

That cannot be forgotten.

And it’s not like it’s hard to avoid these things. Wear a little sunscreen next time you pop outdoors or grab some long-sleeved clothes to cover your exposed skin.

It’s a patronizing thing to write, but we all forget sometimes.

Trust me. I’ve got the burn to prove it.