Ring out the old...

It's time to embrace another new year with open arms. However, I have never been able to fathom the reason for being excited about January 1st. How come we are so happy to push out the year we welcomed only 365 days ago? Are we tired of it already? Or is it because we believe that things would be different in the next year, and that the next year will bring with it the joys we seek...a bigger home, a faster car, 'true' love, a fatter paycheck? How is it that we think when the needles of the clock huddle together at 12 am on December 31st, our fortune will undergo a major spin?
Alarmingly, this fad to ring out the old and ring in the new spilling over all facets of our lives. We are constantly trying to rediscover ourselves, losing our basic identity in the process of etching a new one. Why not start celebrating what we are, rather than who we want to be? Why not raise a toast to the moment we are living in and appreciate what we have with us here and now...rather than celebrate in anticipation of something which may or may not happen.

My world in a bottle

There's something about nostalgic about perfumes. Every fragrance takes you back to those days when you used it first...that point of time when you'd dab a bit of it on your skin for the first time, when the smell was still novel to you...the time when you'd brag about this new fragrance to your collegues or friends. Then days pass, that bottle is almost empty...there are a few more sprays left, but you think, what's the point. If you are like me, you'd walk into a store that weekend and purchase a new one with a different fragrance. But months or even years later, you happen to walk to the store to buy yet another bottle of perfume, then you see the brand/fragrance you used long ago and think, "Hey that was nice! Let me get that again." The next day, when you spray it, you'll notice that there is a strange sense of familiarity, you are transported to the time when you first sprayed the mist.

It been 13 years since I first used Yardley Rose, which was a gift from my dad, when he returned after a week long trip to London and even now a whiff of Yardley Rose reminds me of the days when my bedtime stories were all about London. 12 years have gone since used Pears cream, yet another gift from my dad who returned from a short trip to Kenya, but even the thought of that fragrance brings to my mind the excitement that I felt as a 12 year old child, whose father was back home from a faraway land, laden with gifts! Eight years later, using Royal Mirage Day, takes me to the USA, which is where I first opened that maroon bottle. The smell of Tommy Girl brings sweet sorrow. That too, was a parting gift from 2 of my very good American friends. I used it during my trip to Paris and sprayed on liberally on the first day of my college in India. The MTV series perfumes were gifted to me by my cousin when I graduated. Using them reminds me of my first real job.

Funny how a few mili liters of liquid trapped in a small bottle, has the capacity to infuse nostalgia, transport you back in time and take you on a trip down the memory lane.