I wear perfume. When I leave for work or a meeting, I always dab a little on. Most of the time, my perfume is based on a blend of oils from Singapore which I discovered 6 years ago in perfume shop in the Muslim section of town.
It was a beautiful shop with mirrors on the wall and delicate vials displayed on shelves and behind glass door cabinets. A young man approached me and politely asked if he could smell my wrist. I was embarrassed to offer him my white sweaty arm...but he took it gently and inhaled me.
It was...rather erotic...but he was all business...and in a few minutes created a special perfume for me...oil based rather than the customary perfumes from France which have an alcohol base. The perfume was thick and amber-colored and when I inhaled it....it calmed and relaxed me.
I still have a little left....I learned to copy the smell with oils I purchase from a speciality perfume shop which specializes in scents like amber and sandalwood. I wear this perfume in some combination almost every day except for rare days when for some reason I need to wear Teddy's perfume.
Teddy was my husband's roommate in college. Handsome, theatrical, uber-intelligent....he knew right from the first day of college he was going to be a physician. He was known for reading paperbacks in physics and chemistry classes and of course pulling A's in those very same classes.
Senior year....Teddy knelt down in the cafeteria on one knee and asked me to marry him. He promised me a beautiful house on Long Island's North Shore with a white picket fence. Had I been to the north shore of Long Island at that point in my life, I would have grabbed his hand and ran away with him. He proposed when my future Hub and I weren't seeing each other....and since I was still rather stuck on my future hub.....I gently took his hand...and said I would think about it.
While Teddy was in medical school he called me one night....very angry....saying if I had just said yes....perhaps things would have been different for him. Teddy had come out of the closet...and admitted he was gay. I never knew he could carry such hatred ....and when he hurled all these words at me blaming me for his fate....I was so wounded I cried in jags for days. Months after....he called again to apologize...and I began to understand on a personal level ...what a long and sometimes agonizing journey it is to admit to a different sexual orientation.
A while back....I visited Teddy....now a prominent pediatrician and community activist in his city. He was throwing a party at his fabulous yuppified old house near the city center. Although the party was "casual", I decided to dress up.....skirt, heels, makeup...good choice.
I melted when I first saw him.......he looked fabulous in the way gay men look fabulous....buff from the gym, expensive cologne.....salt and pepper hair.....perfectly ironed shirt... slim tight jeans...leather loafers. I realized how much I liked him...and still did......he took me by the hand and introduced me to a room full of his gay friends. "This is the woman I almost married." Jaws dropped, men ran in from the adjoining room to look at me....for Teddy had always been gay to these people so a woman in his life was rather .....astonishing. I wanted to kick him...because in a way....it was a highly theatrical...almost staged type moment...he must have loved it...... I was immediately engulfed by a group of men who wanting to chat with me. I could feel them studying and analyzing me ....who is this strange creature and why did he like her?
As the party wore on, I met a rather interesting woman.....stocky but pretty....who pulled me aside and told me she was a transvestite. He had been married and had three children...but was happy now living as a woman.
His makeup was superb.....in fact.....he whispered to me...that I needed to wear eyebrow liner since I was obviously a natural blond and needed to darken up my brow. He chastised me for not wearing perfume. "You have cleavage, natural cleavage....stick something down there that will smell good...men will be looking there anyway....so give 'em a whiff." He suggested I find a "cheap store" and buy...."Exclamation Noir".....a 25.00 bottle of perfume that he felt would be just perfect for me..... it would bring out my inner Marilyn Monroe. I wrote the name down on a small piece of paper he found in his purse.
At the end of the party....Teddy asked me to stay for awhile....we stood in the doorway.....holding hands waving to guests that were leaving. For a moment, it felt like we were living the life we could have....waving to people in the doorway of our house. He closed the door....we talked for a while...and then he walked me to my car. He kissed me on the cheek. We hugged for a long time. We both had tears in our eyes when I drove away.
I bought the cheap perfume and loved it....but it's a strange potion....borderline cheap...somewhat exotic....and no longer made by the company. It's very powerful so I can only wear it atcertain times and certain days and always under my clothes.... to diminish the intensity. Too much of it and you smell like someone that should be standing on a street corner....just enough and you feel like someone else.
Today I needed to feel like someone else......so I wore Teddy's perfume...and thought of white picket fences around houses on the North Shore.
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