Jun 12 2002
Ginger
Is there anything cooler than having your best friend’s first novel on your nightstand?
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I do all my best thinking in the bath, though thinking is relative with me, given the depth of my shallowness. While in the bath yesterday, it occurred to me that I seem to have an obsession with ginger, yet I never noticed it before.
My perfume and my bath stuff are all the ginger collection from Origins. I love the spiciness of the ginger and the freshness of the citrus. And you don’t smell it on every other person. And you don’t completely repel innocent passers-by, leaving them gasping in your wake as the wearers of the unspeakable Calvin Klein perfumes do. I find Eternity, with its clingingly pervasive urinal cake aroma, particularly hideous. Once John and I were buying cologne for him in LA, and the salesman said he hated all the Kleins. With a look of utter disdain and elegant repulsion on his perfectly tanned face, he said, “I could never recommend it.”
Ginger and citrus seems to be big with me, too, because the only cookies I really like are Carr’s ginger lemon cremes. The balance of spicy, crispy cookie and cool, tart lemon filling is irresistible. I have been known to eat the entire box in one sitting. OK, I pretty much always do. I also adore gingerbread and candied ginger, but otherwise I’m not much of one for dessert.
The final proof of the ginger obsession is that I so admire red hair, aka ginger hair in England (think Ginger Spice). It is amazing to me that something so beautiful just occurs in nature, like hummingbirds or roses or sunsets. Despite the admiration, I have never dyed my hair red and my husband is only the second redhead I have ever dated, the first being a high school boyfriend whose mother hated me on sight, correctly suspecting me of despoiling her baby. If it’s ginger, I’ll probably love it.