I didn’t hate at the universe until it realigned itself; I just accepted that it was askew and needed a little constructive nudging.
-“Askew Tornadoes“, 11/10/2024
I have two bottles of fragrance, one for home and one for work.
(I used to own three, back when I was accepting the premise that I was a writer who sometimes wore MomAndSpouse-skin and at other times WhateverIWasDoingAtWork-skin. I let that argument go and carried on shuffling the two remaining skins, so to speak, but that’s a tangent for another time.)
Every time we move, whether it’s across town or across the country, I change my home scent. It’s become a way to usher in a new chapter of life as we settle into a new place. I buy a new broom for the house and a new perfume or eau de toilette for me. For years now, home has been the Aerin Mediterranean Honeysuckle I picked out when my son started his freshman year of high school.
I change my work fragrance every time I move between employers or take on a multi-month freelance project for a new client when I’m working for myself. I kept the same scent (Philosophy’s Amazing Grace Bergamot) when shifting from my last job to the current one, since my old company was acquired by the new one.
In a week’s time, I will dump what’s left of the work scent without any immediate plans to replace it.
For the past fifteen years, my husband’s and my in-office requirements have balanced each other out, even during periods when I have been an employee instead of a freelancer. Starting in January, they won’t anymore. There are reasons why this balance between what work wants from us and what home needs from us is still necessary: reasons that sometimes make me want to rage clean … though I know that hating them won’t make them more reasonable, even if my house might stay cleaner.
We’ll adjust. We do. This is just another move. I just haven’t figured out what it smells like yet.
Modus Dementi 