Making Perfume out of Rain

One of my favorite childhood memories takes place at a quaint bed and breakfast somewhere in East Texas. I've been reminded of it several times recently, and now that I take a closer look, I find myself learning a new lesson from the six-year-old Scarlet.


Shadowy images, specific smells, and a plastic cup are pieces of what make up the memory of the night I decided to make perfume out of rain. My family was on a short vacation for a reason I cannot remember. It was a Texan spring evening. It began to rain, a slow drizzle. Perhaps out of childish wonder, or boredom, or a desire to smell like my mother, I decided that I would make myself some perfume. I knew what rain smelled like, and I loved it. So I put a plastic cup on the lawn of the lovely little house we were staying at in order to collect some. My logic was simple: in the morning I would crush some flowers I had found in the yard and put them in the rain water. I would then have the most beautiful-smelling perfume in the world.

In the morning, I did what I had set out to do the night before. I took my flowers (not noticing that they were now a bit wilted) and put them in the cup of rainwater. I crushed them with my stubby fingers, reasoning that they would release their smell into the water. After doing so, I knew that I held in my small hands a cup of the loveliest thing I had ever smelled, and that I had created it.

I don't remember whether I told my mother of my endeavor or what the perfume actually smelled like (probably plastic and grass). I only know that at that moment, I took some out of its cup and placed it on my wrist and neck, and for the rest of the day I knew that I smelled like a princess of the wild, like a fairy or like Thumbalina.

I knew what I was doing when I was six. I knew what I wanted and what I was creating, and I had faith that it would work out, that it was beautiful. I want to incorporate that into my artistic life now. I want faith that I am making something that smells beautiful. I want to feel like that princess of the wild. I think I'll go out next time it rains, collect some drops of water in a jar or plastic cup, and put crushed flowers in it. Then I'll douse my wrists and neck and lay on my floor and know that it is right.