Nude for the road

For his famous 1934 movie, It Happened One Night, Frank Capra has his heroin Claudette Colbert succeed at hitchhiking where Clark Gable had failed by pulling up her skirt and showing some skin of her beautiful legs. There is no doubt some male hitchhikers could succeed with certain drivers by doing something similar, say, taking off a shirt. And if that worked, why not take off more? Maybe you yourself have driven down the highway, seen an attractive hitchhiker, and imagined him standing there, stark naked and begging for a ride. Now that's the stuff of fantasy.

But let's take the fantasy a little further: Why is he hitchhiking naked? Just to attract attention? Or maybe he has no luggage, no knapsack, nothing but the skin he was born in. Maybe his mates stripped him naked as a prank. Maybe he got drunk and separated from his clothes at a party the night before. Or maybe he lost a bet or a dare. Whatever the reason, he's naked and helpless, with nothing to bargain for a ride — except perhaps to do you some kind of favor. Surely you would have mercy on such a hitchhiker, wouldn't you? And surely you could think of some way he could repay your kindness?

These were some of the thoughts going through my head as I stood naked and vulnerable on an uncompleted stretch of freeway at sunrise with photograph Andrew Adam Caldwell. I'm not sure how many driver speeding by below caught my naked form illuminated by the rising sun. But I was completely exposed in any case. I'm only glad I wasn't really in the position of our fantasy hitchhiker, although it would certainly be a memorable predicament.

But to get a real sense of what's that like you need more than my words. You need pictures, and we have plenty of them for you. Go directly to Nakedism's photography department and check out the set called Road Show. Then add a comment below telling us how you'd handle that situation.