A Rose by Any Other Name…

Excuse me while I go hippy on y’all. Let’s talk about B.O.

Over the past few weeks I’ve had several conversations about how we react to each other’s armpit aroma. Studies have shown that we are attracted and repelled by each other’s smells based upon how similar or different we are biologically from each other.

This also seems to change with the time of a woman’s cycle. When women are ovulating, they tend to prefer the smell of men dissimilar from their family group, while preferring similarity at other times of the cycle. This suggests that, as a species, our genes want hybrid vigor while maintaining the security and stability of family groups.

So, if scent is such an important part of our compatibility, why do we slather our underarms with Febreze? What made our natural scent nonsensical?

I’ve noticed I smell differently depending on how happy my body is. When I am feeling good, calm and mellow, I smell like Italian food. When I am feeling stressed, I smell more like burnt rubber meeting a Cup O’ Noodles. When I am feeling sexy, I smell more like cinnamon. Our body odor reflects our emotional wellbeing.

According to legend, our fetish for bathing dates back to Queen Victoria, who declared that it was the thing to do. Now, keep in mind that this was the Virgin Queen. I am going to presume that she didn’t really smell spicy. As precarious and overburdensome as her job was, I’d imagine that she probably smelled like burning tires for most of her adult life.

I could understand her thinking, “There’s got to be a better life for my nose than this!”

And yet, we’ve shut down a big part of our compatibility code. Every woman I have spoken with on the subject has said that body odor compatibility is a vital part of the relationship.

So… how about if we get used to smelling each other again? Maybe a stressful work environment will work to correct itself merely because it smells bad? We wouldn’t be able to hide when we aren’t taking care of ourselves, and our friends could be more aware of this and step in if necessary. And when we get together with people who are taking care of themselves and enjoying themselves, we could enjoy not just the sight and feel of them, we could enjoy the scent of sensuality, too.