la vie en rose
For the second time in as many weeks, I'm doing the Friday Five. This is like, a miracle or something. Or maybe they only just got interesting. XD
1.) What are your favorite smells/scents?
Vanilla. Musk. Apple Pie. Lavender. Great Indian food. Great Italian food. Great food. A bonfire in Tim's backyard. The chemicals we put on our Christmas tree. Barbecues. The scent of the family Christmas Candles (jasmine, I think, and wax, and history, and love). The inside of a Lush store. Chocolate. Tea. A whole bunch of perfumes (see below).
2.) Do they bring back memories for you? If so, what?
God, yes. I have a very sensitive and unusual sense of smell (I think it's directly connected to my sense of taste, which isn't exactly surprising), so things are particularly acute for me. The smell of bonfires reminds me of a lot of things, mostly fall nights in Tim's backyard with beer and laughter. The Christmas Candles remind me of family, family, family. It's a special, sensitive scent that's started to fade as we've added more wax to the mix, and it breaks my heart. I've even saved a candle just for the smell.
3.) What are your least favorite smells/scents?
Burning hair. Burning plastic. Yankee Candle stores. Coffee. Hazelnut. Tobacco smoke. The last three give me migraines, actually. Either smelling or partaking will do the trick, and then I'm off, hiding under my pillow for a night.
4.) Do they bring back memories for you? If so, what?
Not really. I get migraines, so it's not so much memories as it is blinding pain. I don't have too many negative memories associated with smell, thank goodness.
5.) What are your favorite perfumes/colognes?
We can start with my mom. Whenever she and my dad would go out on a date, she'd get all gussied up, put on a swipe of mascara, and Anais Anais, by Cacharel. She'd hug us goodbye, smelling delicious. Then, she'd come home after the date smelling like steak and scotch and cigarettes (back in the day when people could smoke at the bar), and still, like Anais Anais. Sometimes when I'm home I'll use her perfume instead of mine, and I love that I smell like her.
Wes used to wear some cologne or aftershave when we first met; I can't for the life of me remember what it was, exactly. One Christmas he got a sampler of different colognes-- a whole bunch of tiny bottles. Some smelled great, some were HORRIBLE, some he still has kicking around. But one Valentine's Day I got him this small bottle of Very Sexy for Him, by Victoria's Secret, and it was all over after that. He uses it most days, and if he has to leave early he'll kiss me goodbye and the smell will waft over me and wake me up. A couple months ago he mentioned he was getting low, and I gleefully checked him off my Christmas list-- I got him a large bottle of it, and he was so, so happy. He smells musky and sweet and there's something else I can't quite put my finger on, but it's delicious.
The first cologne that I really fell in love with was courtesy of Tim Lee. He was cute, and funny, and nice, and such a player; he seriously was a professional flirt, all at the age of seventeen. He wore Cool Water, by Davidoff, and it smelled divine. He had a scarf he wore in the winter that was completely infused with Cool Water, and I remember a week where me and a couple other girls passed his scarf around, wearing it in class, and smelling that cologne. It's a great cologne, and with such fond, silly memories.
The summer before my sophomore in high school, I dated a boy from the next town over named Billy Stanford. He and I worked at the same arts camp, and he was a horrible flirt, and such a sweetheart; you see a guy playing with kids, and it's just downhill from there. When we started dating, he started wearing ck one, by Calvin Klein. I'd come home 'reeking' of it, according to my mother. There was one time in class in college when a girl sat down next to me, and she was wearing ck one. I was so distracted that I had to leave class to clear my head.
Personally, I didn't wear perfume until the spring of my sophomore year in high school. I wore cheap body spritzers from places like The Body Shop, but nothing really specific. Then I went to France. The group spent a few days in Paris, then a few days in Nice; while in Nice, we did a day trip to Eze and to tour the Fragonard Parfumerie, learning about perfumes and soaps. It was absolutely amazing, and I walked out of there with a small bottle of Miranda. I love the scent-- warm, sweet, musky. As they describe it: "Miranda is an oriental eau de toilette marrying vanilla, sweet myrrh, amber, flowers and coconut, highlighted with a pinch of bergamot." I'm not a frilly fruit or flower type of girl; this is more my style.
I was dating John when I first started wearing it; nearly two years after we broke up he dropped off a gift for my eighteenth birthday (after he'd completely ignored my sixteenth, which was when we were dating). His mother works as a consultant for a French company, and he had her pick up a bottle of Miranda the last time she had gone to Paris. It still blows my mind that he thought of me, enough to have her pick it up when she was in France. I just saw him this past Christmas Eve and gave him a big hug, and when we pulled away, he noted that I was still wearing the same perfume. Amazing, what the sense of smell can do with our memory. When Wes and I were over in Europe, we did a daytrip to Eze again, and I picked up another bottle of the perfume, thank goodness. I now realize they deliver to the United States, but I'm still glad I have some. I don't even smell it when I wear it anymore, unless I specifically smell my pulse points.
They say that the last sense to leave us is smell, and that memories are more closely tied to that than anything else, and I don't doubt it. It's a sense that often defies description, closely tied to taste, a sensitive and deeply personal sense. I love my perfume, I love to smell Wes' perfume, I love my mother's perfume... They tell the stories of our lives, of who we are and what we love. It's a subtlety, really.
1.) What are your favorite smells/scents?
Vanilla. Musk. Apple Pie. Lavender. Great Indian food. Great Italian food. Great food. A bonfire in Tim's backyard. The chemicals we put on our Christmas tree. Barbecues. The scent of the family Christmas Candles (jasmine, I think, and wax, and history, and love). The inside of a Lush store. Chocolate. Tea. A whole bunch of perfumes (see below).
2.) Do they bring back memories for you? If so, what?
God, yes. I have a very sensitive and unusual sense of smell (I think it's directly connected to my sense of taste, which isn't exactly surprising), so things are particularly acute for me. The smell of bonfires reminds me of a lot of things, mostly fall nights in Tim's backyard with beer and laughter. The Christmas Candles remind me of family, family, family. It's a special, sensitive scent that's started to fade as we've added more wax to the mix, and it breaks my heart. I've even saved a candle just for the smell.
3.) What are your least favorite smells/scents?
Burning hair. Burning plastic. Yankee Candle stores. Coffee. Hazelnut. Tobacco smoke. The last three give me migraines, actually. Either smelling or partaking will do the trick, and then I'm off, hiding under my pillow for a night.
4.) Do they bring back memories for you? If so, what?
Not really. I get migraines, so it's not so much memories as it is blinding pain. I don't have too many negative memories associated with smell, thank goodness.
5.) What are your favorite perfumes/colognes?
We can start with my mom. Whenever she and my dad would go out on a date, she'd get all gussied up, put on a swipe of mascara, and Anais Anais, by Cacharel. She'd hug us goodbye, smelling delicious. Then, she'd come home after the date smelling like steak and scotch and cigarettes (back in the day when people could smoke at the bar), and still, like Anais Anais. Sometimes when I'm home I'll use her perfume instead of mine, and I love that I smell like her.
Wes used to wear some cologne or aftershave when we first met; I can't for the life of me remember what it was, exactly. One Christmas he got a sampler of different colognes-- a whole bunch of tiny bottles. Some smelled great, some were HORRIBLE, some he still has kicking around. But one Valentine's Day I got him this small bottle of Very Sexy for Him, by Victoria's Secret, and it was all over after that. He uses it most days, and if he has to leave early he'll kiss me goodbye and the smell will waft over me and wake me up. A couple months ago he mentioned he was getting low, and I gleefully checked him off my Christmas list-- I got him a large bottle of it, and he was so, so happy. He smells musky and sweet and there's something else I can't quite put my finger on, but it's delicious.
The first cologne that I really fell in love with was courtesy of Tim Lee. He was cute, and funny, and nice, and such a player; he seriously was a professional flirt, all at the age of seventeen. He wore Cool Water, by Davidoff, and it smelled divine. He had a scarf he wore in the winter that was completely infused with Cool Water, and I remember a week where me and a couple other girls passed his scarf around, wearing it in class, and smelling that cologne. It's a great cologne, and with such fond, silly memories.
The summer before my sophomore in high school, I dated a boy from the next town over named Billy Stanford. He and I worked at the same arts camp, and he was a horrible flirt, and such a sweetheart; you see a guy playing with kids, and it's just downhill from there. When we started dating, he started wearing ck one, by Calvin Klein. I'd come home 'reeking' of it, according to my mother. There was one time in class in college when a girl sat down next to me, and she was wearing ck one. I was so distracted that I had to leave class to clear my head.
Personally, I didn't wear perfume until the spring of my sophomore year in high school. I wore cheap body spritzers from places like The Body Shop, but nothing really specific. Then I went to France. The group spent a few days in Paris, then a few days in Nice; while in Nice, we did a day trip to Eze and to tour the Fragonard Parfumerie, learning about perfumes and soaps. It was absolutely amazing, and I walked out of there with a small bottle of Miranda. I love the scent-- warm, sweet, musky. As they describe it: "Miranda is an oriental eau de toilette marrying vanilla, sweet myrrh, amber, flowers and coconut, highlighted with a pinch of bergamot." I'm not a frilly fruit or flower type of girl; this is more my style.
I was dating John when I first started wearing it; nearly two years after we broke up he dropped off a gift for my eighteenth birthday (after he'd completely ignored my sixteenth, which was when we were dating). His mother works as a consultant for a French company, and he had her pick up a bottle of Miranda the last time she had gone to Paris. It still blows my mind that he thought of me, enough to have her pick it up when she was in France. I just saw him this past Christmas Eve and gave him a big hug, and when we pulled away, he noted that I was still wearing the same perfume. Amazing, what the sense of smell can do with our memory. When Wes and I were over in Europe, we did a daytrip to Eze again, and I picked up another bottle of the perfume, thank goodness. I now realize they deliver to the United States, but I'm still glad I have some. I don't even smell it when I wear it anymore, unless I specifically smell my pulse points.
They say that the last sense to leave us is smell, and that memories are more closely tied to that than anything else, and I don't doubt it. It's a sense that often defies description, closely tied to taste, a sensitive and deeply personal sense. I love my perfume, I love to smell Wes' perfume, I love my mother's perfume... They tell the stories of our lives, of who we are and what we love. It's a subtlety, really.