Perfume for sale! Tree Hugger or Fresh Bread

There are legends of people who don't wear deodorant, because others assure them that their natural scent is so enticing, deodorant or cologne would only corrupt it.

My dad used to say fresh alfalfa was my mom's natural smell, and his expression clearly showed that he thought it was the best scent in the world. He made rabbit fare sound romantic!

I recalled this the other morning while lying in bed. My hair smelled really bad. I had spritzed myself with perfume the evening before, and the perfume had mixed with natural oils and big city particulates in my hair, making my crowning glory malodorous. I'm surprised my husband didn't move to the couch during the night.

My husband has a good scent. I joke about finding his sweet spot, behind his ear or on his neck beneath his whiskers. I'm pretty sure he could go a good three days without a shower and not offend me.

However, my scent comes from whatever Mother Nature decides to slap on me as soon as I step out the door after my shower. If there is even the slightest breeze, heat, humidity, pollution or dirt around, I end up smelling like dust, exhaust fumes and wet, decaying leaves. My skin and hair just soak it up! I suppose it's nature's way of claiming me, but no matter how romantic being an outdoor girl sounds, it certainly reeks! Even my expensive perfumes are whipped into submission by my inherent tree-hugging wild woman.

Maybe I should only hug Eucalyptus or Cedar trees from now on?

My husband, chivalrous as he is, actually told me recently that I smelled good - late in the day, too - but I'm pretty sure that was only because I had skipped my usual make-up routine, and he was grasping for something to compliment.

Fresh alfalfa? I'd be happy just to smell like stale cheerios!  I don't smell like anything fresh unless I've just pulled a loaf of bread from the oven.

Hiding vehicles and avoiding calls

The three most irritating sounds are a doorbell, the knock, and a phone ringing. They mean someone is about to bother you, and usually uninvited.

How do we handle the strain of knowing our cellphones – an inhumane tool of intrusion that we carry around with us - could go off at any moment?  No wonder people have such short attention spans! They’re slaves to the knowledge that their dentist, child’s teacher or hair stylist could interrupt their life at any moment via a ring, buzz, beep, or annoying pop tune.

A few days ago my prehistoric cellphone was dying. Normally that would be a crisis of near apocalyptic proportions for the modern-day human enslaved to technology. I cast about halfheartedly for the charger, but all I found were the revitalizers for my kids’ tablets.

I figured my dumb phone would pass with dignity into temporary night. Instead, it kept emitting death yelps every few minutes for more than an hour, persisting like an opera tenor who keeps singing despite the improbability of drawing deep breath after stabbing himself. Eventually, I began screaming at my phone during each mournful beeping, “Just die! Die already!”, while wishing for a rubber mallet to help it along.

Thankfully, my husband’s number has its own ring on my cellphone, and it’s the only sound I truly welcome from it most of the time. But even then, when he calls from the store one too many times with a silly question, I want to remove him from my contact list.

I blame my aversion to being bothered on my dad.

On many Sundays of my childhood, Dad drove our car into a little hollow in the field behind our house to hide it. If someone unexpectedly knocked at the door on the weekend, Dad gave the silent, urgent command for us to stop in our tracks and crouch down out of sight of the windows. Then he held a finger to his lips with the intense look of a hermit. It was like freeze tag, only more tense. We dared not move or make one little squeak, no matter how our hamstrings ached, until the intruder gave up his efforts to bring us to the door.

Maybe that’s why I got into trouble with the law several years ago when my oldest son Berto called 911 by mistake as I was vacuuming. When I took the receiver from my laughing boy and hung it up, I thought it was merely a telemarketer - until a policeman banged on my door a few minutes later.

I wasn’t expecting a policeman, so I didn’t answer the door. I interrogated him through the wood, asking why I didn’t see his patrol car (around the corner, apparently) and what precinct he was from. Eventually, however, he tired of my evasive maneuvers and quite dramatically threatened to knock down the door if I didn’t answer it. At wit’s end, I called my husband at work and cried, “Honey, there’s a man at the door who says he’s a policeman! What should I do?”

“Answer it!” was my pragmatic man’s reply.

The thought had never occurred to me.

I’m this close to parking my minivan in the backyard on Sundays.