Naked Gardening: A Privilege? Or a Right With a Responsibility?

I love Boulder, Colorado.  To a consummate observer of human nature, this town is an eccentric gift that keeps on giving.  Boulder’s history is ripe with examples of political protest, civil disobedience, and affluent college kids setting sofas on fire for no comprehensible reason.  Just last week, passersby were appalled and appalled again at the double-take of 52-year old, Catharine Pierce, publicly tending her plot in nothing but a thong and pink gardening gloves.  It seems like only last year that she was threatened with eviction for gardening in only a thong and pasties.  Well, I guess 2010 was Catharine’s breakout season and she decided to go rogue and rip off the pasties.  OUCH!  Now, before I go further into my observation, nakedness, without the below-the-belt bits showing, is absolutely legal in Boulder.  From bra burnings, to Halloween streakers, to La Leche members feeding their six year olds, Boulder women have been whipping out the girls with little fanfare for years…until now…until the uncovered heinie of mile high horticulture stepped out to enjoy the Spring weather and prune back her brush in public.

Upon taking their fourth and fifth looks, Catharine’s neighbors called the police citing public indecency.  An officer responding to the call urged Pierce to consider putting on a shirt since children at the school across the street were outside playing. Ultimately there was little the policeman could do.  Catharine Pierce wasn’t breaking any laws.  As a result, the unfulfilled local electorate is petitioning the City of Boulder to expand its nudity ordinances. 

Come on, citizens of Boulder, you are going about this all wrong.  From one boob to another, why not consider an approach that has nothing to do with America’s overly conservative preoccupation with nudity.  As a social liberal (and accused Socialist) you might think my first inclination would be to regulate nudity and tax it, but you would be wrong.  Instead of bothering with the legalities of decency laws and wasting the valuable time of our officers of the peace, why not fashion the restraint of nude gardening around the personal safety issue?  Just as there are seat belt laws and helmet laws, there should be laws about hoeing around 52 year-old, gravity worn, knockers!  The rose bushes alone could induce severe and life-threatening blood loss.  And if this doesn’t work, there is always the “common good” principle.  How is this good for me to catch even the faintest glimpse of anyone out in public wearing only a yellow thong, pink gardening gloves, and since this is Boulder, those disgustingly smelly, perforated rubber shoes inappropriately named after a reptile.  THERE is the decency…or lack of it.  Call the fashion police as this is definitely 911 worthy. 

Now you know I jest.  You don’t have to remind me that people have the right to be tacky, or WalMart wouldn’t sell spandex in XXXL.  But just because there is a right, should you do it or do it to excess?  There is a right to free speech, but should you yell racial slurs, spit on, and verbally threaten those you oppose?  There is a right to freedom of the press, but should words be used to recklessly slander, intentionally mislead, or libelously injure?  What I am trying to determine is the point where rights and responsibility go hand in hand. 

Those of you who are acquainted with me know that I have no problem with nudity.  The human form is a god-given and artistic creation.  In the privacy of my own property and certain beaches here and abroad, I have been known to shuck my clothes along with my inhibitions.  Though you probably won’t see me in my front yard tending my tulips.  That is where my personal responsibility takes over.  There is nothing wrong with naked gardening…depending on the motivation you are cultivating.  Perhaps that is where we all, myself included, should become a little bolder.