My Fragrant Week

Riding my bike on an overcast morning the mist and salt water cleared my head. I felt the season changing. It was in the air: the scent of fall. I looked to my right and I saw Casa del Mar. I recalled many childhood summers coming to an end at the old Del Mar Beach Club. Then it became Synanon, Pritikin, and alas, hotel Casa del Mar.

I entered Grauman's Chinese theater, and inhaled the aroma of buttered popcorn. I remembered I had celebrated my 5th birthday there. The movie was My Fair Lady. I turned to Tim, who has the ability of asking the most simple of questions that cause you to think just a little bit harder than you would have before ha asked. "Do you remember where you sat?" A clear memory of the aisle I sat in, who I was with, and what I was wearing came to me. New white kid gloves, opened that morning.

I could see the gold and pink I. Magnin's wrapping. I was with my father, my sister, and two friends.

This weekend I went to see Bright Start. The popcorn quaffed art house

devoured me. I could not wait to see Jane Campions new film about John Keats and his 18th century fashionista Fanny

Brawne--it was so beautiful.

On Sunday morning I awoke to

carnival in the air--cotton candy, lemonade, hot dogs--I recognized immediately the perfume of the Abbott Kinney

festival.

Candra came to visit with her portable trunk of exotic fragrance. As we sniff each vial, I am traveling around the globe revisiting places I've been and some I've only imagined.

At Strange and Invisible on Abbott Kinney they are featuring the new Fall scent, Fire and Cream. I take a whiff and find myself sitting in my family's home eating caramels and almonds, bickering with my little sister.

I can only conclude from all of this smellery: the nose has an amazing memory--nostalgic and precise.

All for now--

We will speak next week.

Be nice,

Pamela Barish

P.S. My personal fragrances from the last five years.