Tami, figure model

Today I made my first close-up observation of Miss Tami Smithers.  As arranged, I went to Professor Brignon of the Art Department, who explained that Miss Smithers had agreed to serve as a model for their figure drawing classes.  Miss Smithers had come to their rescue, because the college had announced that this semester it would be opening up these classes (along with some others) to the community and to the students at the local community college, only to be suddenly faced with a shortage of models.  Fortunately back in December Miss Smithers agreed to fill the void.  The classes are held five days a week at 8:00 a.m. sharp.  Previously there were five models who worked in rotation, but Miss Smithers agreed to fill in “full time” for all five classes.  She deserves much praise for getting up every weekday and braving the early morning cold this time of year, though I realize that she is not only getting credit for these courses but is also being paid the going rate for a nude model (which understandably is quite high).

        As agreed, I would observe at the first class of the semester by pretending I was one of the students.  I bought a large newsprint pad and got there early and sat in the back.  The class was in a large standard classroom with plenty of light from the windows.  I could see that there was also a pedestal set up in the middle of the room, a polished hollow wooden cube about three feet high.  Though there was plenty of light from outside and from overhead on this bright winter morning, there were also small spotlights, not yet turned on, that hung down a little from the ceiling and pointed in toward the pedestal.  Two concentric circles of chairs with easels had been set up.

        Professor Brignon came in from the supply room and welcomed me.  When I told her the room seemed a bit chilly considering there would be a nude model -- a couple of the windows were opened a crack -- she said that due to Miss Smithers’s habits she had quite a resistance to minor drafts.  I then remembered that I had already been told this by Dean Jorgon, and remembered that Miss Smithers would be coming here -- no doubt running -- from Pilgrim Hall, which is halfway across campus, and the temperature when I left the house was two degrees above zero.

        Students gradually poured in and took their places.  I was struck by the mix.  There were grandmothers, people even older than I, going down through middle-aged, and then the returning students, then the usual early-20’s college crowd, and then very young people who must have been from the community college but seemed to me to be like high schoolers.  I was glad to see that the room was filling up nicely.  It’s good that the college is able to attract such large numbers of different kinds of people from off campus.  They were also very talkative; they had clustered in little groups where the people knew each other.  The room was alive with chatter.

        The chattering stopped suddenly as the naked young woman, Miss Smithers, walked in and wordlessly went to the pedestal and sat on it.  Obviously everyone knew this class involved a nude model, but apparently they didn’t expect such suddenness.  They were probably expecting the model to arrived clothed and then discreetly change out of her clothes in the supply room.  As it was, the class sat wordlessly and stared at Miss Smithers, who was flushed and breathing heavily, obviously because of the brisk run from her dorm.  I had been expecting a cushion or sheet of some kind for her comfort’s sake, but evidently Miss Smithers, who uses no blankets or pillows on her bed, did not require such amenities.  She sat with her bare buttocks on the cold-looking painted wood of the pedestal, eyes downcast, hands folded primly over her lap, bare feet crossed, as she caught her breath.

        Professor Brignon introduced herself to the class and welcomed everyone.  She also introduced Miss Smithers, calling her by her first name.  The campus nudist looked up with a brief glance and nodded before looking down again.  Miss Smithers appears to be, in spite of the exposure dictated by her lifestyle, quite a modest and unassuming young lady.  Upon instruction from the professor she quietly and obediently climbed up to stand on the pedestal, the thump of her bare feet resounding throughout the room, and assumed a classic statute pose, looking out the window.

        The class went to work.  I tried to keep up appearances by doing some perfunctory sketching, but I’ve never been any good at drawing, and anyway my concentration was focused on Miss Smithers and the class’s reaction to her.  I’ve never been in a class with a nude model but it seems that models are very serious about their work.  Miss Smithers did not smile; she looked stonily out the window.  I was also once again aware of the chilly temperature of the room, especially after the wind blew through some of the partly-opened windows, causing even me to feel cold.  I felt greedy wearing all these clothes, including a flannel shirt, a sweater, heavy boots, and thermal underwear, with all the others wearing heavy clothing as well, while this young woman was standing up there in the cold without a stitch to protect her.  I could see her nipples were hard and erect from the cold, and there were goose bumps on her bare buttocks.  She was a real trouper.  The sacrifices that people make for art!

        The Professor had Miss Smithers go through a series of poses, three minutes each.  This was the first class and we were only to do some quick, sketchy renditions.  For some reason I had been under the impression that models in such classes create their own poses, but the Professor was very particular and dictated each pose to Miss Smithers in detail, speaking loudly so that the class could hear.  No doubt the Professor wanted to maximize the educational benefit to the class by letting them know exactly what was being asked for.

        Most of the poses seemed like typical statue poses -- standing at attention, pretending to be throwing a javelin, sitting with head in hand like the famous “Thinking Man”, etc.  But some were very unorthodox, or at least they seemed that way to me.  In one pose, for example, Miss Smithers faced the other side of the class, legs together, arms extended up and out.  There was apparently a slight misunderstanding; the Professor came over and gently coaxed Miss Smithers’s legs apart, getting her to spread them by degrees so that finally she formed a very wide “X”.  From my view it was amazing to see such a display of feminine beauty, unmarred by tan lines.

        Naked women tend to look like they are in an incomplete or unnatural state, and clothes tend to make impressions on a body -- tan lines as I mentioned, or indentations caused by belts or other tight things, or skin that is pale because it is always covered up or encased, cramped toes, bunions, etc.  But the body of Miss Smithers looks totally, well, “natural” without clothes, as if this is the way it always was and always should be.  The fact that she is a trained gymnast and her body is in superb physical condition only highlights this fact.  Even her pubic hair, never pressed by clothing and continually ruffled by the wind, seems unusually fluffy and lush.  I think the other students were also struck by these thoughts.  Certainly everyone around me seemed energetic as they tried to render the well-toned muscles in her buttocks, her legs, her outstretched arms.

        Miss Smithers then turned around and made the same pose facing in our direction.  My comments apply as well to the front of her body; again, her breasts, never being covered or restricted by a bra, had a natural shape lacking in other women which I can’t describe, with the nipples perched just so; there is just something about the slope of her breasts.  It was amazing Miss Smithers’s breasts did not sag, given the lack of a bra, but perhaps that was due to her youth or her exercise regimen.

        What also struck me was the facial expression that she assumed for this pose.  She was looking up at the ceiling with a mixture of anguish and pleading.  I recognized this glance as the classic expression of Jesus looking up from the cross -- “Father, Why hast thou forsaken me?” -- and it was clear to me that this was deliberate, given the fact that her body was forming a cross.   I found myself smirking; probably she and I were the only ones in the room who were in on the joke.  My cynical side also recognized this expression as a triumph of acting ability.  Here she was, getting paid nicely and also getting college credit for simply standing around naked like she always was.  Anguish and pleading were the last things that would be naturally felt by her.  Indeed, in many ways nudity seems to be working to Miss Smithers’s advantage on this campus.

        In another pose directed by the Professor, Miss Smithers was bent over, legs slightly apart, touching her toes.  From my side all one could see were her buttocks and the backs of her legs -- but one could also clearly see her vulva and her anal area.  Were we supposed to draw these parts?

        The Professor quickly removed any doubt as to that.  Coming up next to the pedestal, she faced us on this side of the room and motioned to Miss Smithers’s “private parts” (I suppose I should call them), which were almost at her eye level.  In her French accent the Professor said, “I know the main thrust of this class is to render the muscles and the joints, but pay the very close attention to Tami’s vulva and anus.  These are parts of the body like any other part, and to learn to draw them one can master the kinds of curves and lines that come in handy when you to draw other things.  Wait while I please to get the light.”

        With Miss Smithers still bent over, the Professor turned on the spotlights, and the brightness allowed us to see every nuance and crease and hair on our nude model’s body.  One light ended up being trained especially on the parts I’ve just mentioned, making them all the more prominent.  Miss Smithers must have had an itch or something near her eyes; she rubbed them, her head still down, and quivered a bit, her hanging breasts swaying slightly, but then returned to her former hands-down posture, her head hidden behind her legs.

        “You can see very well in Tami’s crease here, so please take the most advantage of it,” the Professor said.  “Look for example at Tami’s anus, the lines how it puckers.  It is like when you kiss,” she said, puckering up her lips and lifting her head upward as if about to receive a kiss.  Some of the younger girls erupted in nervous laughter and the Professor broke into a mischievous smile as she went to the other side of the room.

        Still pointing at the relevant parts of Miss Smithers’s anatomy, the Professor asked the students on that side to take notice of the slope of the young lady’s hanging breasts, and the angle of her nipples, which were constantly erect and hard in this chilly room, and to pay careful attention to the curves there.

        I was struck by this young woman’s composure.  The Professor had told me that, with modesty not a concern as with other models, the class could absorb the extra learning that came with more intimate poses that would not be possible with the typical model.  Miss Smithers never made any motion to cover any part of herself.  Nor did I ever get the sense that she was an exhibitionist who got a thrill of some kind from displaying her body.

        Such a total absence of self-consciousness as to one’s body, such a total dedication to being fully exposed at all times, showed me at first hand what had only been reported to me: that Miss Tami Smithers had a deep, unshakeable faith in her beliefs which few of us, no matter what our creed, ever achieve.

        In the last minutes of the class the Professor had one more pose for Miss Smithers which required a prop.  To everyone’s puzzlement, she pulled from the supply closet a piece of rope tied into a big circle.  She got up on the pedestal, made a loop, and flung it over one of the floodlight supports.  “This last pose will simulate a ballet dancer in a kick most high.  For Mademoiselle Smithers it should not be strainful because she is also an accomplished gymnast.  But even she would find it most hard to maintain the pose without the assistance.”  The Professor twisted the rope into a figure 8 and drew Miss Smithers’s leg up into the other loop.  The naked young woman shifted to accommodate this new position and followed the Professor’s detailed instructions, and when the Professor got down from the pedestal, Miss Smithers was standing facing the doorway, her ankle suspended from the loop, her arms wrapped around the upended leg as if cradling it, and her head resting on her arms.  It was an extremely high kick; her bare foot was well up over her head.  Obviously only a gymnast could be so limber.  I could see the toes of her lower foot flex and unflex as her body balanced into a stable position.

        The Professor then brought over a little goose-necked lamp and put it on the pedestal in front of Miss Smithers.  When it was turned on, it brightly illuminated the insides of her legs so that we could better see the muscles there.  (It also had the effect of illuminating her crotch and I could not help but notice that her labia, bright and pink in the harsh light, had parted.)

        The unusual play of muscles, tightened and relaxed, in various parts of Miss Smithers’s body occupied the class’s attention.  The scraping of pencils on paper was the only sound in the room as everyone worked industriously.  Some of the young community college kids even came up to sit down right in front of the pedestal with their pads, looking up for a close view, some from the rear but most in front, heads nodding up and down as their gaze went from the model to the pad and back again.  As for me, I tried my best with my meager drawing ability.  It was fascinating to try to capture the lines of the muscles on Miss Smithers’s buttocks, her back, her legs, and her arms.  It was easy to see that with a dedicated nudist as a model this class could cover a lot more ground than if poses were strictly circumscribed by the typical model’s sense of modesty.

        The hour was winding down and students could be heard out in the hallways heading for their 9:00 classes.  No doubt the sight they were presented with as they passed by the door was arresting and unusual.  Several stopped by to look in from the doorway.  The Professor did nothing to discourage this impromptu audience, after all these were art students too.

        As for Miss Smithers herself, I noticed that she maintained the same serious expression, at first looking up at the toes of her upraised foot, which she wiggled occasionally.  Then she closed her eyes as if pained by something.  She kept her eyes closed, her brow furrowed.  It was a moment before I recognized the look on her face.  She was praying!  So there was some meditation attached to her type of religion, and she was taking advantage of these moments of stillness to engage in it.  This was interesting.  The intensity of her concentration impressed me, as the furrow in her brow increased.  When, after a few all-too-short minutes, the Professor announced the end of the class and told Miss Smithers to come down, the young lady’s eyes opened and I could see that they were a little wet and red.  Such is what happens sometimes when a devout person has an intense, fulfilling prayer that has provided insight and regeneration.

        I wanted to introduce myself to this remarkable young woman but I didn’t want to do anything to hint at the existence of the committee.  Instead I watched as she nodded to the class and to the Professor and started to leave.  A grandmotherly type who had been sitting near the door intercepted her and tried to engage her in conversation.  The grandmother was packing up her pad and putting on her heavy overcoat and she looked up at the naked girl as she asked questions I could only barely make out: Are you always naked?  What is your major?  How do you like this college?  I couldn’t make out Miss Smithers’s answers but it did seem like she was time-pressed and she politely ended the conversation and left.  She must have been in a hurry to get to her next class; I could hear the sounds of her running bare feet slapping away down the hall.

        This was an amazing experience for me.  I was just in awe of this young woman.  While realizing that the Professor was exploiting the situation for the benefit of her students, it just was unbelievable that Miss Smithers could so casually submit to such intimate exposure, so totally free of the strictures of modesty which society has ingrained into the rest of us.  It’s almost as if she has transcended our culture.  In a way it reminds me of St. Francis communing with nature in the face of the materialistic, mercantile society which surrounded him.  I will report my thoughts and observations to the Dean.