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I have a primeval forest scent, like moss and petrichor, but to my ex it was clothes-left-in-the-washing-machine musty. He gave other reasons for walking out, but I know that’s what made him leave me.
His new girlfriend smells like roses, and cotton candy some days, and on others, cocoa butter and cinnamon. Sweet treats because she’s twenty-something and fertile. Did I smell different in my youth? Of naivety and vanilla? Will I still be a catch to someone, even if I can’t give off that metallic tang of copper, even though I’ve borne all the children I’ve been given to bear?
It’s the vitamins, one doctor tells me, the ones that keep my skin shiny and my hair full of collagen and whatnot. It’s what I’m eating, says another, and I think about my salmon poke bowl, my penchant for spice. My friend ate so much garlic they smelled like an Italian restaurant for days. Why can’t chocolate do the same? Or coffee? I want to be someone’s morning java jolt again. I want to be someone's salt lick.
My friends take a sniff and say I smell like me. What does that even mean? I’ve gone scent blind to myself. My friends who offer me their favorite scents to wear. Floral, citrus, aromatic they declare. These flavors don’t suit me. If I wanted to be someone I’m not, I’d bathe in pine and peppermint and smell like Christmas. God no!, they say. And wonder if my midlife crisis is too ginormous for Sunday brunch. I should be planning children’s weddings like they are and not wondering why my pheromones are phera-gone.
But it’s when they mention their husbands, their long-lasting, non-cheating hubbies, that's when they look at me to gauge my reaction. When they lower their voices as if worried that some of my husband-left-me-for-a-younger-woman stink will rub off on them, like BO lingering in a hot car, soaked into the upholstery forever, that’s when I smell their fear. They lift the collars of their blouses to make sure they still smell happy and married, not dusty and musty, too long on the shelf, and best stored in the attic with mothballs and cedar.
That’s when I down the dregs of my Bloody Mary. Drop some cash on the table, tell them I’ve got a date. He’s anosmic, I say, and they think “agnostic,” which is fine with me. It’s not that I’m avoiding the issue at hand; it’s just nice for once to have one less thing about aging to worry about when I’m dating, at least until I find that bear of a man who wants nothing more than to snuffle and sniff and revel in all the heady goodness of my forest primeval.
🌳🌳🌳
This piece was developed after reading an article about “Old People Smell”.
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