The Associated Press
SEASIDE — The centerfold luxuriates on her back in Sunset Pool, sporting little more than a sprinkling of rose petals and a smile.
She had never exposed herself this way before. But like her friends, she discovered that for the right cause, and with the right sensitivity, she could bear to go bare.
A group of 20 Clatsop County women, all over 60, posed for the calendar "Sunset Ladies" to raise money for a new warm-water therapy pool at the Sunset Pool facility run by the Sunset Empire Park and Recreation District.
The pool has been built. Proceeds from calendar sales are to finish paying for it.
Patricia Bradley, a longtime pool patron, first suggested the idea after a similar successful effort for a calendar benefited leukemia research in Rylestone, England.
"It’s a 21st-century version of a bake sale," said Mary Blake, executive director of the Sunset Empire Park and Recreation District. "These women are beautiful and strong and healthy. They’re showing off their stuff — their enthusiasm, their excitement and their stories."
The models say putting together the calendar bonded them and forced friends and family to look at them differently.
"People you go to the locker room with have got to be your best friends, don’t they?" Bradley said.
Polly McKee, 79, said her granddaughter could hardly believe McKee was posing nearly nude.
"She came up from San Francisco to see what I was up to," McKee said. Her family members have placed multiple advance orders for the calendars.
"After all, I’m not dead yet," she said, winking behind the bright red frames of her eyeglasses.
The calendar may be fun, but McKee says the intent is serious. "I have really bad arthritis. If it weren’t for this pool, I’d probably be in a wheelchair."
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