This tween anxiety — the melodramatic fear of making a bad choice, a choice that would change your course forever — seemed particularly acute when it came to picking out a fragrance. Because — and I would challenge you to ask anyone who was young in suburban 90s America to tell you otherwise — picking out a signature body scent was one of the first, and therefore most important, missions for teens set loose in the mall to harness their own destinies before rendezvousing later with their adults at a designated (and discreet) pick-up spot. Fragrance shopping had to be done alone, or at least with no parental supervision. Not because it was particularly taboo, but because it felt like such a loaded, intimate decision, one that involved armpits and crushes and being kissed for the first time. In the ‘90s, not a lot of teens had large fragrance wardrobes — the going idea was that you chose one scent at a time and stuck with it, until people (read: people you might want to go to a dance with) started to associate it with you, until you could waft out of math class smelling like Cucumber Melon and everyone in the next period would know you’d been there. The immensity of that decision could feel pretty crushing.
