osprey_archer | Mermaids

Ali Weinstein's documentary Mermaids braids together the stories of many different people in the United States who dress up as (and often identify strongly with) mermaids: professional mermaids who swim at the Florida resort Weeki Wachee or in an aquarium above a bar in Sacramento, California, a semi-professional mermaid who does birthday parties with the assistance of her mother (who has also gotten into the mermaid thing, and bought herself a tail), and amateur mermaids, like the members of a mermaid meet-up in California who hang out on the beach.

(I would die to stumble upon a mermaid beach meet-up, that sounds like the most magical thing.)

The documentary as a whole has an air of magic around it, although it does deal with some rough material: some of the people profiled are drawn to mermaids as basically a coping mechanism for trauma, like a woman in Harlem whose identification with mermaids began as a result of her childhood sexual abuse, or a transwoman in California who struggled for years to accept herself and found help in this struggle through mermaids.

But generally the actual mermaid part generally seems to be an overwhelmingly positive experience for everyone. Even the Weeki Wachee mermaids, who went into mermaiding as a job rather than a calling, reported on the feeling of joy and freedom that they felt underwater. (Of course, there’s doubtless some reporting bias here: if you’re talking to the Weeki Wachee mermaids who still go to Weeki Wachi reunions decades later, naturally you’ll catch the most enthusiastic ones!)

And it struck me, also, how beautiful everyone looked in their mermaid costumes, even if they were overweight or old or otherwise didn’t fit general American conceptions of beauty. Maybe everyone just looks lovely underwater; or maybe it was just that they were all so happy to be floating free.