Shelf Life: Over!

I used to wear perfume all the time. In college I had a signature scent that I loved, and at some point I couldn’t find it anymore. But after a quick search online, I found it is available again! It’s called Lou Lou Perfume and it was “my” scent for 3-4 years.

When I got heavily into the rave culture, Lou Lou clashed with the smell of dank, dark warehouses filled with cigarette smoke, and so I switched to a scent much more pleasing: vanilla. Back then, The Body Shop carried very basic perfume oils, and my favorite was vanilla. I’d put it on and would hear random people say, “Do you smell cake?” when I walked by. Vanilla on it’s own is an incredible perfume. I’d say I wore that up until the late 1990s.

Then I went through a period, soon after I moved to New York, where I got into various scents. If it had vanilla notes, I’d buy it. After a few years, I had at least 12-14 perfume bottles in my arsenal.

And then I stopped wearing perfume in 2003 when I got pregnant with CootieGirl. I had major smell aversions during my pregnancy and perfumes were the worst culprit. It got to the point where if the head honcho of the office came into work (she seldom did), I’d know it instantly. “Is Barbara here?” I’d ask, and would undoubtedly find out that she had just arrived. No one else thought her perfume was overwhelming, but I did. It was as though she BATHED in it (or so my pregnancy hormones told me).

And so for the past several years I have very rarely worn perfume. It’s just not “me” anymore. Yesterday I thought I’d try one of my perfumes, just for old times’ sake. I picked out Hanae Mori, which I loved when I first discovered it.

By the time I got to work I was gagging. I hated it. Yes, the perfume is old, but the basic scent was still “functional” and I couldn’t stand it. I scrubbed at my skin in the bathroom to get rid of the scent as much as I could.

Today after I took my shower, the Hanae Mori bottle was thrown in the garbage. I contemplated my other bottles, and threw out a nearly empty bottle of Poeme that had clearly gone from lovely perfume to paint remover.

I finally selected Ellen Tracy and put that on. Ah, much better. I can remember when I first discovered this perfume I got a lot of compliments on it. It’s a delicate scent, more flowery than I would normally choose, but nice. This bottle will stay in the collection (it’s almost empty as it is, showing you how much I loved it when I first got it).

Don’t know what I’ll choose next. I won’t be wearing any perfume tomorrow since we’re going gem mining all day and I don’t need bees chasing me around the rocks all day. But on Sunday I’ll have to pick something out – maybe L’eau D’Issey which was one of my favorites, too. Or maybe Weekend by Burberry.

I’ll continue to whittle down the perfumes until I only have 3-4 left. And then I’ll debate whether I want to add Lou Lou back into the elite sorority that’s left behind.