Ghost of Perfume Past

She was 27, single mom and worked as a CEO’s personal assistant (even though she graduated from a university – those were strange times in my native country). From time to time our boss used her real specialty – a translator – during business meetings with English-speaking suppliers. On one of those trips she met and started dating an older American guy. I’d never seen him but heard a lot about him from her.

Looking back now I think he was just a creep who figured it wouldn’t cost him much to get a younger lover in a poor country to where he had to travel on business. But back then both she and I were quite naïve and we both thought about those relationships as real and going somewhere.

On one of his visits he brought her a lot of clothes from Victoria’s Secret catalog (do you know any men shopping that catalog??!) and a perfume. Rapture.

For me it was love from the first sniff. I liked everything about Rapture – the scent, the heart-shaped bottle, that it came from the U.S. My co-worker let me try it once but after that I was tortured by her wearing the perfume I wanted.

Until then I’d never heard about that brand, it wasn’t present in the country. But I wanted to get it so much that I asked a friend who by that time moved to the U.S. for help. It was before Christmas when he’d got to the store and there was some huge promotion happening so I got not only a bottle of the perfume but also some other treasures.

Because of customs, it didn’t make it to me in time for Christmas or New Year. But eventually I got it and owning this bottle that came to me from another part of the world made me happy.

When I moved to the U.S. that bottle of Rapture came with me. For several years I enjoyed wearing it but since it was my “dressed-up” perfume I didn’t go through the full bottle. And then I grew out of Rapture as well as Victoria’s Secret’s other offerings. But I just couldn’t throw away that bottle!

The remaining juice is more concentrated than it used to be and, I think, the smell changed though not much: those were quality chemicals, you know. I need to take a trip to the mall and check out how Rapture smells today though it’s a commitment: once Rapture bonds with my skin it stays there for hours – even 15 years old juice from my bottle.

What is the oldest perfume bottle in your collection (not by vintage but by the time you owned it)?

 

Ghost of a Perfume Present

What is your favorite color? For many years my favorite color in clothes was black. The reason was rather unpoetical: when you do not own too many items black is the easiest to combine and the most stain resistant. Even now with enough clothes not even to joke about “absolutely nothing to wear” the number of black pieces especially when it comes to shoes is completely disproportional.

When it comes to perfumes, this year I suddenly developed a soft spot for blue/navy bottles and juice.

Yes, I have a long love story with Angel and its great flanker Angel Taste of Fragrance was a logical continuation of it. My star bottle is old and the color has changed a little – that’s why there is a small bottle of the same perfume in the picture.

Yes, I liked Lancome‘s Mille et Une Roses for a while and used up some samples before snatching a partial bottle on eBay.

Yes, I hoped I’d like Annick Goutal‘s Nuit Étoilée not only because I liked the brand but because I loved the bottle. But at least I tried the perfume before adding that beautiful bottle to my collection.

And yes, I did test Armani‘s La Femme Bleue from a small test vial before deciding if I want to open the bottle I’ve bought un-sniffed.

But there is no reasonable explanation to why I’m browsing Internet for cheap bottles of Van Clef & Arpels’ Midnight in Paris and Feerie: I’m not sure I smelled them – let alone tried on skin.

I am under a Blue Spell.

Will you guess what perfume I plan to test next – solely because of the color?

 

Ghost of a Perfume Future (aka New Year Resolutions)

From the list of New Year resolutions for the current year I failed mostly on the new bottles in collection limits so for 2013 I made a decision … to remove any limits.

I’m restricted to some extent by a common sense, budget considerations and space limitations – so I think those will be enough for me not to go overboard completely. But otherwise I do not want to restrict or formalize my hobby any more.

I decided not to care how many untested samples I’ve accumulated already – as long as I know that I have them. I’ll get a hundred more (though I’m still not ready to pay for most of them – let’s swap!): one day I might want to test them even if I don’t feel like doing it today.

I will not hold back on publishing pictures of Rusty: he’s one of the best perfumed cats since he spends a lot of time on my lap and doesn’t mind an inevitable transfer of the perfumes I test from my wrists to his fur.

I’m not sure if I’ll make any general NY resolutions but when it comes to the fragrant part of my life my resolutions are to enjoy my perfumes, my blog and my perfume friends.

 

Images: my own

 

Take a look at more Christmas Ghost posts on these blogs today:

All I Am – A Redhead
Another Perfume Blog
ChickenFreak’s Obsessions
EauMG
The Muse in Wooden Shoes
Olfactoria’s Travels
Suzanne’s Perfume Journal