cologne/parfum

I've had this thought for a while, but didn't write about it. Perhaps because it makes me sound homosexual. But then I heard Kevin Wildes talk about it so I guess it's okay.

One could argue that men's cologne and women's perfume should switch scents.

For example, one of my wife's favorite scents is vanilla. Another typical favorite of women is lavender. So, to appeal to my wife, shouldn't I wear vanilla? If she likes vanilla, why am I wearing Old Spice?

To extend the argument, I like the smell of Old Spice and Irish Spring. Shouldn't women wear those scents to appeal to me?

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The answer is of course wrapped in the problem. The reason I like Old Spice is because I think it smells manly. I think that because that's the way it's been presented and marketed for decades. So I like it and wear it because it's what I've been told to think a man smells like. And women (in theory) want me to wear Old Spice because it's what they think a man should smell like.

So even though my wife likes vanilla, she probably wouldn't like it on me, because it's not what I'm supposed to smell like.

The whole thing makes you think about why we like what we like. And it would seem that it comes down more to advertising/marketing/business than it does what people might prefer in a world without that business.

(Of course, you could point out that animals, including humans, have pheromones, and that is the idea behind cologne/perfume. But is Old Spice or vanilla perfume really mimicking what our pheromones smell like?)

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Also, I had an unrelated thought this morning, because my forehead was dry. What did people do 100 years before lotion? If I was around in the prairie days, I would have told a child complaining about dry skin to go dip his face in the river. But water never makes your skin less dry. It's tricky like that.