Scented

My mother has always smelled so good. Before they reformulated the recipe, she wore a perfume called "Royal Secret", layering her skin with all its scented choices of powder, lotion, and perfume. When you hugged her, atomized fragrance floated into you and over you in a gentle cloud that clung to your clothing long after parting. Walking into her closet was like walking into Goldsmith's department store, and the fibers of her robe were steeped in the flowery essence of all that Royal Secret. I don't believe she uses it anymore, but she still smells wonderful.

The lesson of targeted perfuming settled on me late in life because strong fragrances have generally always given me headaches, but I now realize I have no trouble with lotions and light aromatics, and I want to smell as good on approach as my mother.

Plus also, I not long ago sat in church next to a young fellow whose feet I could smell, rendering me incapable of concentrating on the Lord - at all.  It struck me then just how vulnerable we are to one another in close settings. What if it were my feet coming between someone's personal relationship with God? What if they were unable to hear that still, small voice while battling with my wafting b.o.? Or worse - stanky breaf.

(As former congregants of the Church of God, we followed Jesus' example by holding a "foot washing" after church some Sunday evenings - confirming my theory that this is no accidental doctrine by any means - not by the church, and not by Jesus.)

Therefore, even though I have always been an ardent bather and scrubber, I now, layer on a veritable bouquet of cologned goodies. I travel with wisps and gum in my purse and, just in case, I keep my feet tucked well underneath my chair in church. I feel that as Christians, it is up to us to add our personal redolence to the promptings of the Holy Spirit.

In fact, churches should offer this lesson starting in Sunday School - and they should let my mother teach it. Children everywhere could learn by example at her (thankfully unscented) feet.