Girl Anachronicles

At the beginning of this week, at some point while I drove, I had the distinct feeling of being back in 1999. How does that happen? Was it the smell? I’ve been aware for about ten or eleven years now that one of my favorite senses is the sense of smell. Contrary to taste, it hasn’t been as deeply crippled by my smoking vice. My eyesight is not the best either (I have a mild case of progressive myopia and astigmatism, a trademark for computer professionals). I think I might have also lost some of my hearing at one point or another, since I can remember having problems with it as far as 11 years ago. And hell, I can’t go around touching everything I please! Haha! So … smell!

Smell is what drives me around my world: with a whiff of fragrance I’ve been able to recognize someone faster than by a look to their face. I get hungrier by the smell of BBQ’ed steak than by the sight of a juicy meat cut. The fragrance of apple/cinnamon incenses and candles has been irrevocably associated with my stepmother. Same applies for the smell of perfumes like Shalimar, Ciara and Anais Anais (each one represents an era in my mother’s life). Some smells have haunted me for years as well, like for example the aroma one of my friends exuded, which I was never able to identify as any cologne, soap or perfume I knew. Others, I will never forget, like the smell of puppy breath.

I can better determine how dirty my house is by the smell that welcomes me in the afternoon. The tiles can look clean as whistles, but if I can smell mop water, I know it’s time to clean up a bit.

It’s safe to say then that each era in my life has a set of smells inherent to it. Perfumes on the trend are primary examples of how this works, and then there are also the smells of friends and places (years 1995 – 1997 had a high incidence of fun fair smells – musty oil, vomit and cotton candy).

But what happened to me earlier this week, I’m sure it wasn’t a smell. Smells are just the perceptible face of the deal. When I felt like I was back in 1999, it wasn’t the smell of business office lobby that triggered it. It must have been the feeling of impending doom, of sunlight bouncing off mirrored windows from offices in buildings towering overhead. It must have been the realization (and in a way, coming to terms with) that I am what I feared I’d become. Thankfully, that same morning I decided to take control of what I could to change what I didn’t like in my life. I’ll start with the small things … like the smell of my car.

No sé cómo es que uno se olvida de los olores con el tiempo y sin embargo eventualmente el elemento más aleatorio lo resucita como si estuviese pasando de nuevo. Hace muchos años, cuando todavía mi papá era completamente infeliz y tenía dinero, él usaba perfumes como si fueran calzoncillos: no sólo los cambiaba con frecuencia, sino que los usaba el día entero, y al final ya apestaba.

Aparentemente, la fricción continua del shampoo de miel de abeja (fricción absolutamente necesaria, porque bañar a una cachorrita de 3 meses de edad y 15 libras de peso no es tarea fácil si ella así se lo propone), al cabo de un rato termina oliendo a Drakkar Noir … o alguna otra de esas pestilencias que usaba mi papá. También es increíble cómo uno le puede tomar cariño a un olor que en cualquier otro caso terminaría provocando una migraña.

Al oler eso, la memoria viajó a una parte que hacía tiempo no visitaba. Era una época problemática, de consternación y confusión. Todos esos años en los que mi papá no fue feliz y en los que no sintió la necesidad de ocultarlo sirvieron para conocer un lado de él que prefiero no repetir. Era algo gris, opaco, oculto, oscuro. Los regaños provocaban más terror del que pueda tenerle uno a mi papá en estos días, y los momentos felices frecuentemente tenían la sensación de un chocolate hueco.

Mis hermanos y yo creo que nos acostumbramos a ese tormento interno de nuestro papá, creo que por eso nos rebelamos tan asquerosamente cuando al fin conoció a alguien que lo hizo sonreír desde adentro nuevamente. En ese momento, mi papá dejó de usar perfumes. Creo que finalmente ya no le hacía falta la máscara.

Wish you had smell-a-vision. Then you’d be able to smell this…

I know, it’s classified as “WTF” if it’s coming from me, tooting Puff Daddy’s horn for designing such a delicious fragrance (or tooting P. Diddy’s horn at all). It was unintentional and the associations to the perfume made the purchase so much easier (and impulsive).

A few months ago I started reading the Sandman comic series by Neil Gaiman, and about time, given the whole lot I had heard before about the comic. I loved it, and I immediately connected with Delirium.

Thing is, one day I’m walking around a mall, and I picked up a small paper card sprayed with this perfume that I pretty much liked. I stowed the paper away, and took it home, used it as a bookmark for Brief Lives. The perfume permeated the whole book, accompanied me in the Delirium-ridden story, got into my nostrils and my senses until the smell of it was forever associated with Dream and Delirium.

This past weekend, Mom insisted on taking me shopping, and I budged. There were more than a few things I was wanting/needing. I decided to go snooping around Macy’s perfume department, and I really don’t understand how I recalled the name of the perfume so clearly. What I didn’t remember so well was why I was remembering a perfume named Unforgiven.

As soon as I whiffed at it again, the decision was made, I had to have it. This perfume IS Delirium, this perfume IS Dream. It wasn’t until I was drawing out the credit card to pay for it that I noticed what the signature on the back stood for.

Puff-fucking-Daddy, aka Sean John. Jeez!

But then again, he’s got a better nose for fragrances BY FAR than all the little Hollywood bitches designing stenches for the gullible masses.