On smelling like someone else

Yes, I realize that is a bizarre title for a blog. Let me (try to) explain.

I borrowed a spritz or two of perfume from my friend yesterday, and the scent is still in my scarf, which is currently wrapped around my neck, right under my nose. It's a scent I like. It reminds me of this expensive shampoo I used to have. Which I only bought because it smelled like "bitchy girl." It reminded me in some abstract way of the rich girls, the high-maintenance girls I'd always avoided in high school. The girls who seemed to have everything so easy. I bought the shampoo because for a few hours after my morning shower, I felt like everything was easy for me. I imagined that men turned their heads when I walked by. I set my jaw differently. I walked taller. I pretended that I didn't have to care about anything.

I knew it was just a ruse, even back then. But it was fun to pretend. Now this smell doesn't remind me of those bitchy high school girls, those sorority girls on the train, those girls at the bars. It reminds me of those moments when I got to walk down the street and find a different sliver of myself. Ironically, the strong, bold part of me had been hiding deep down in there for a long time.

My vanity drawers are now full of perfumes and lotions and soaps, and all kinds of smell-good that I've collected over the years from gift exchanges and my mother's clean-out-the-cupboards projects and whatnot. And I get to choose how I smell on a daily basis. And up until yesterday, it all still somehow smelled like me.

But now, this scent on my scarf is foreign. It's a memory; it's not of the present. It's a different-meaning thing altogether to my friend who lent it to me (though, I'm not sure I'll really quite be able to give it back-- haven't worked that one out yet), I'm sure. For me now, it's a reminder of a good feeling I used to get. But it's no longer the cause of that good feeling. I'm pretty sure I don't need a shampoo for that anymore.