Submission can take many forms as can an obsession. I obsessed over Alison Tyler’s words for 48 hours when I first read her book Dark, Secret Love. I cooked with it in one hand, crawled into bed and enjoyed my own secret love, and willingly submitted to the delights that it inspired within me. I found myself immersed in a lifestyle that while foreign to me, was strangely familiar. If you’ve not yet read Dark, Secret Love it comes highly recommended, in fact, you can read my review HERE. Alison was gracious enough to share a piece of her writing with Clitical and below you will discover a little about Alison’s own dark secret love.
Just one perfume
Written By: Alison Tyler
One of Byron’s many quaint little quirks was his insane insistence that I never change my perfume. I’d been wearing Anaïs Anaïs since I was twelve, and as far as he was concerned, I was going to wear that sickly-sweet scent until I died. So after running through the whole slew of perfumes at the Macy’s counter, I wound up with a classic bottle of Chanel #5. (And since that day, I have been extremely fickle. I’ve never managed to choose another signature scent.)
If you’ve ever read my bio, you’ll know that I am what you might call perfume-challenged. I simply can’t choose just one perfume. I wish I could. I’d love to be loyal like that. Unfortunately, I’m a Dance-away lover when it comes to scents. For a decade I wore Anais-Anais. Since I gave up that baby-powder, good-girl fragrance, I’ve never been able to stick with one.
Do you want to know how weird I really am?
I choose certain perfumes for different colors of clothes. No, really.
Red: Gucci Rush—spicy, mean, hard-edged, a bad-girl scent.
Pink: Hanae Mori—like cotton candy, fluff, pink clouds—I can pretend to be sweet, can’t I?
Blue: Ralph by Ralph Lauren—blue, simply blue—to me this is what blue smells like.
Green—Un Jardin Sur le Nil by Hermes—it’s not that I would search out green mango on my own, but this one is addictive.
Gray—FCUK for her—I swear I didn’t buy this for the name. It’s practically unisex, and I do occasionally wear men’s cologne. I appreciate the roughness.
Purple—Lolita Lempicka—licorice and rubber tires. Quite honestly, I don’t know why I like this one so much.
But I also will to wear choose scents based on the texture of an outfit. Pencil skirt and cashmere sweater? Chanel #5. Every fucking time.
I love samples and I’ll squeeze every last drop out of the magazine tear-sheets. I’ve been known to wear two fragrances together, which is apparently a major no-no. But I don’t care. Where perfume’s concerned, I break all rules.
Occasionally, I’ll find a smell that I think will be “the one.” In my early twenties, I was a Dune girl. More recently, Calvin Klein’s Beauty lingered with me for several months. I wore it with all the colors of clothes. Until I found Givenchy’s Ange ou Demon. And that took over my life