#30 Passages of time...

As crazy as those fictional Kellogg’s Crunchy Nutters are about their cereal, I am about my body cream. I douse, slather, baste, steep and mask myself in the stuff at least twice a day. I've unearthed some fab finds - the Brown Earth will always be a favourite, but, yes, I've raved on about it enough – but come summer, I’m a rotten changeling - eternally drawn to new scents and textures.

I cannot stress enough the strength that the correct scent has had on my wellbeing. I must have very finely tuned passages as I map out the majority of my life with my nose. I still remember one torrid summer when I’d been advised to try a Brazilian bikini wax and fallen narcissistically in love with my newfound smoothness… as had my new boyfriend. We were abroad and temperatures rose to beyond 40 degrees. We spent hours in cold baths, fingering ice cubes – or pouring chilled water over our poolside bodies.

This summer, we escape to similarly sweaty climes for another week. I am not sure, but I think that perhaps I have found my new companion. The Hei Poa Baume Au Monoi. I scanned the ingredients list and was disappointed to see several ‘ates’ and ‘yls’ – when it comes to bodycare, I strongly believe the shorter the ingredients list, the better – but last night I rubbed a thick layer onto the back of my left arm (I used Liz Earle Nourishing Botanical Body Cream on my right) and compared them in the morning. Hei Poa won by a mile. My skin was silky, soft, back-of-arms bumped reduced and retained the appealing scent. I shall continue to use it for a week without interruption and am interested to see whether or not my skin continues to react so positively – as positively as my husband, who last night held me tightly, inhaled deeply and said that I reminded him of that heated holiday, years ago. His nose had led him back to summer. In a clichéd coconut sense, Hei Poa smells like ‘summer’… yes… and summer, for us both, will always be that single, sweltering season. It might have been London and we had no sea to cool off in, but that scent took us back. Nasal passages indeed.