Dichter op de Huid - O dubbel d

In the skin
Skin is an organ
Mankind is an illness on the Earth’s skin
Immanuel Kant
Skin breathes and lives. Dead skin cells are
rejected unnoticeably; per hour, we lose
approximately two million. Unnoticeably, new
cells are formed and a web of elastin to keep
us supple and collagen to keep us firm is spun.
Unnoticeably, our glands keep us oily soft and
impermeable. Inflamed from the sun’s rays,
our skin browns and we change from soft pink
to red brown: melanin pigment adorns us and
protects us. Inflamed by the sun’s rays we produce vitamin D to
strengthen our fragile bones. Inflamed by the warmth of the sun,
our skin cools our bodies.
However, if the skin that once protected us gives up, she
becomes lazy and unreliable. The cells become tired, as does the
body, the skin becomes thin and vulnerable, less flexible, flabby and
dry. The sun, once her friend, is also an enemy that harms her. With
the passing of time the skin loses its elasticity, and wrinkles form
laughter or frowns on our faces. However, skin only truly dies when
the heart dies, and then perishes first, as if she had never existed.
In defining with fleshy touches the skin of a beautiful peach
or the melancholy of an old apple, I glimpse in the reflections that
they exchange the same tepid shadow of renunciation, the same love
of the sun, the same recollection of dew, a freshness
Paul Cézanne
About / On / IN / Under thE skin
Essay Skin is an organ
The autonomy of the skin
The skin is our surface, our reaction centre, our means of
communication with the outside world. From times immemorial,
it has reflected our emotions and moods. Our emotional state can
often be discerned from our skin, before we, ourselves, are aware of
it. The human skin is saturated with nerves from the autonomous
nervous system. Autonomous, not in the sense that we are at liberty
to direct the nervous system ourselves, but autonomous in the sense
that it operates with total independence from our so-called free will.
It regulates that which it perceives in all its autonomy to be good for
the body’s internal climate: breathing, pumping blood, digestion
Skin Deep / Dichter op de huid
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