Sun is life

Life

In about two weeks I am getting married and then I do not want to look like a pale sheet. Most people in Israel do not sun bathe at all. Swedes do. For natural reasons. People on the Scandinavian latitude get so limited sun hours that we desperately want to take advantage of them, and this is a habit that we do not easily put a side. This year I have not been really burned even once, but I am still developing my own bright golden tan. Not as much because of using sun screen, as for spending the appropriate amount of time in the sun, i.e. not too much at a time. Sun screen is a subject that I have touched previously, and therefore I do not need to go there again.

Yesterday we went to the pool with the kids after Yoram came home from work. Although we arrived at 17.00 and the sun was pretty low I was the only one on the compound who was sitting in the sun. A very self-conscious person would possibly feel like a complete outcast, but I really could not care less about what other people think. What I do know, is that the extreme cautiousness in very sunny countries like Israel instead causes vitamin D deficiency, which in turn causes diseases like Rickets and Osteomalacia. People are advised to stay out of the sun during midday when the sun is at its highest position, but this is also when the strongest induction of the production of vitamin D occurs. Again, overly protective ideas cause new problems down the line. Use your common sense and enjoy the sun. 15 minutes of midday sun is enough to get your necessary daily dose of vitamin D, and the natural source is so much better than drinking milk spiked with artificial vitamins. Since vitamin D is a lipophilic vitamin, over-ingestion can cause vitamin D toxicity.

Work with nature, not against it. We will never beat it.