She wanted something else, something different, something more.

She wanted something else, something different, something more. Passion and romance perhaps, or maybe quiet conversations in candlelit rooms, or perhaps something as simple as not being second.

Nicholas Sparks

Don't be a parrot in life, be an eagle.

Don't be a parrot in life, be an eagle. A parrot talks too much and can't fly high but an eagle is silent and has the will power to touch the sky.

If you have time to whine and complain about something...

If you have time to whine and complain about something then you have the time to do something about it.

Anthony J. D'Angelo

If you have time to worry about something...

If you have time to worry about something, then you definitely have time to pray for it.

Dr.Bilal Philips

If you are unhappy, change something.

If you are unhappy, change something. Quit your job. Move. Leave your miserable relationship. Stop making excuses. You are in control.




If you're unhappy with something, change it. Life is too short and too beautiful to stay stuck somewhere you don't belong.




If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude. ~Maya Angelou


Oftentimes, we settle for

Nothing is nicer than having someone who appreciates you in the smallest things.

Nothing is nicer than having someone who appreciates you in the smallest things. Accepts you in times of hardships, comforts you when you are troubled, loves you no matter what and is simply happy for having you in their life.

The biggest lesson I�ve learned...

The biggest lesson I�ve learned this year is that no one is really your friend, or truly loves you until they�ve seen every dark shadow inside you, and stayed.

Maybe some things don�t get better, but we do.

Maybe some things don�t get better, but we do. We get stronger. We learn to live with our situations as messy and ugly as they are. We fix what we can and we adapt to what we can�t. Maybe some of us will never be fully okay, but at least we�re here. We�re still trying. We�re doing the best we can. That�s worth celebrating too. If you�re reading this, congratulations, you made it to today. You

I am a strong woman.

I am a strong woman, and I have been through a whole heck of a lot more emotional stuff than this. If I don't succeed at things in my life, it won't be the end of my world, I will persevere and pick myself up again; like I always do and keep moving forward. Because that's what I do...I fall back and then fly forward. If I have to start over to make things better, I will with my dignity intact

I don't do fakeness.

I don't do fakeness. You may not like what I say but you'll always know where you stand with me. If my actions tell you that I like you then I'm not acting. I'm a genuine person. It hasn�t always been that way but people learn and they grow. I don't understand being nice to someone's face and then shit talking them behind their back. I don't understand not being upfront and forthcoming about

Life is all about balance.

Life is all about balance. You don�t always need to be getting stuff done. Sometimes it�s perfectly okay, and absolutely necessary, to shut down, kick back, and do nothing.
Lori Deschene

When someone is mean, don�t listen.

When someone is mean, don�t listen. When someone is rude, walk away. When someone tries to put you down, stay firm. Don�t let someone else�s bad behavior destroy your inner peace.

A heartbreak isn�t always as loud as a bomb exploding.

A heartbreak isn�t always as loud as a bomb exploding. Sometimes, it could be as quiet as a feather falling and the most painful thing is, nobody hears it but you.

Sometimes you just have to turn the page

Sometimes you just have to turn the page to realize there is more to your book of life than the page you are stuck on. Stop being afraid to move on. Close this chapter of hurt, and never re-read it again. It is time to get what your life deserves, and move on from the things that do not deserve you. Do not spend your days trying to correct your past, instead let go and let God create

Years from now, our past will be a story. | Long distance relationship quotes

Years from now, our past will be a story. A story of long days and lonely nights, hard work and lack of sleep. We'll live each day having intimately known the pain of being apart, we'll appreciate and embrace our time together, knowing how lucky to have made it through, and we'll find solace in the promise of a future together.




I exist in two places, here and where you are - Margaret

The Scents of Fall

I switch my light summer fragrances to those with warmer accords when the air turns cool in September. More often than not, the perfume I reach for on chilly mornings is Chanel No. 5.  When I drive over the misty bridge that spans the cove in my town, I often shiver into my scarf or turtleneck and catch a whiff of the blanketed dusty rose that makes up part of the composition of the world's most famous perfume.

Searching for vintage Chanel No. 5 ads is so much fun that I may do a series of them here.  The copy on the ads is very sweet too.  But this one, speaks to my schoolgirl days when I too, walked to school on leaf-strewn streets.  The scents of those days are so embedded into my psyche that as soon as the calendar turns to September, I go into overdrive with nostalgia and memories, helped along by No. 5.

Also underneath the crunching sidewalks that led to school, were acorns and tiny decomposing apples that mixed with the wafting smoke from rusty barrels of burning leaves and branches.  These marvelous things blended together to create an olfactory soundtrack to fall.

Too, there were high school football games held in the old cement stadium known as Kelliher Field.  The seats were gravestone-cold but the cocoa, in perilously thin paper cups, was so searing hot that we could barely sip it for fear we would scorch our tongues.  But it smelled wonderful and deeply chocolate-y.  And somehow it went better with the fragrant buttery popcorn that assaulted us from the moment we stepped though the field's gates which compelled us to buy small red and white cardboard boxes of it.  Oh and didn't our mothers pull out the meatloaf recipes torn from Ladies Home Journal's and stuffed pork chops with sage again that filled our homes with such rich savory smells?  And cinnamon apple pie, anyone?  Back to perfume...

One golden fall, a friend's mother began to sell Avon.  That was the year I wore Sweet Honesty, Avon's answer to the 70's back-to-nature mania.  I fell for the all-natural look of the packaging which appealed to my personal style at the time:   bell-bottomed jeans and long straight hair shampooed with Herbal Essence.  Sweet Honesty came with me to school in a little roller bottle which I'm sure replaced my summer Strawberry Fields scent that year.  I liked Sweet Honesty for its peppery note that was perfect with fall's burnished colors of smokey gold and magenta.  Like autumn, it was both strong and gentle.

The following year I was away at college.  Still in New England, but housed with young women from all over the country.   And since I wanted to fit in, I wore their uniform fragrance - Revlon's Charlie.  Who can forget Shelley Hack's leggy strut across our Seventeen's centerfold in a chic plaid pantsuit?  Charlie was known as the sexy-young fragrance and "sexy" was not an adjective that graced Seventeen much before then.  It was so new and wearing it, we all felt new - and free and young and sexy...

I began wearing Chanel No. 5 when I was gifted a bottle from a woman who knew my father.  She thought as a young working woman, I might like a sophisticated perfume.  But I wasn't quite ready - it smelled cloyingly sweet to me.  I preferred to find my own fragrances and so for many years, I experimented with Cinnabar, Fracas, and that harlot of a perfume - Opium.  But I never did find one to settle on until I tried No. 5 again.  By then, I had read about Chanel and the origins of her iconic perfume.  Suddenly, it was if I were ready for it.  And it has stayed that way for over 20 years.  I always want a small bottle of  Chanel No. 5 on my dresser top come fall.  It's comforting and oddly reassuring.  Like walking in fallen leaves...

~

What are your favorite fall scents? Please share in comments...

And in keeping with back-to-school style, please read my essay on Rebecca Tuite's marvelous book, Seven Sisters Style:  
http://www.fashionstudiesjournal.org/4-reviews-3b/2017/7/28/seven-sisters-style