Because, honestly, relaxation hurts
Words Molly Flatt
“Have a body? You’re ready to go to the beach.”
This is my line of the issue, taken from our Books Editor Sarah Shaffi’s wonderful article on how to choose good holiday books. This time of year inevitably heralds a deluge of body-shaming (some overt, some cleverly disguised) in the press, but we simply don’t have to play ball. Personally, I’m resolved to make summer 2018 the season when I boycott the bullshit, embrace my perfectly imperfect form and focus instead on the one life goal I find really find hard to achieve: chilling the f**k out.
For my Greek husband, relaxation is the default. He only needs to touch a beach, a park bench or a café window-seat to instantly sink into the calm, casually-chatting, iced-frappe-sipping, people-watching zone. I, on the other hand, fight holiday mode with all my might. Once the Mediterranean tyrant has confiscated my phone to prevent me from emailing, vetoed a date-night with my laptop and physically restrained me from doing chores, I resort to picking the fattest tome on my shelf and trying to finally understand exactly how quantum computing works, in thirty degrees (Sarah, I failed).
Thank goodness June PHOENIX is here to help soothe the fractious urban mind. We have William-Morris-meets-feminist-mermaid fashion. We have London’s best Mexican restaurants for balmy tequila and taco-fuelled Saturday afternoons. We have spirit-lifting summer fragrances for under fifty quid. We have festival beauty inspiration. We have a gorgeous June playlist. We have the perfect itinerary for a week-long escape to Macedonia.
And yes, this issue does include a round-up of our Editors’ favourite fitness apps. But – I hope you’ll note – not one of them focuses on guilt, thinness or social acceptance. Instead, they’re all geared towards celebrating the strength, energy and joy of the female form in all her guises.
Even if her brain is a teeny bit mucked up.
MOLLY FLATT
Digital Editor
Molly Flatt is Digital Editor of PHOENIX Magazine. She is also Associate Editor of FutureBook and writes about tech and culture for the likes of the Guardian and the BBC. Her debut novel, THE CHARMED LIFE OF ALEX MOORE – a grown-up adventure with a magical twist set between Shoreditch’s startup scene and the wilds of Orkney – is out now.