Help for fic: Trouble with descriptions...

[slumber]

Uh... how do men smell/taste like? Anything that would concretize the picture? I'm having a bit of trouble not romanticizing the descriptions... I'm stuck with mint and honey and cinnamon and musk. Gah!! Help!!! Must finish this by Valentine's!!!

Comments

[boniblithe.livejournal.com]

They often smell musky and they taste salty. Definitely no honey and cinnamon, unless they've been drinking tea and eating toast just before. Often they smell like cigars or alcohol or coffee. Sometimes they just smell like soap or cologne.

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

Depends on the guy, of course, but going by my memory:

soap
smoke (cigarette or other)
sweet orange juice and whiskey
clean laundry
sweat
salt
chlorine
leather
toothpaste
sand
grass
The various scents of aftershave and cologne, which tend to the sandalwood/pine, musky, or else sea/clean families.

In other words, clean men smell mostly like what's around them -- their various scented products, their clothes, their food, the things they do and the places they spend time. Skin does have a scent of its own, and its different for each person (my most recent ex-boyfriend's skin was my favorite scent in the world) but I wouldn't know how to describe it except by saying *their* scent. And even still it's probably largely their particular mix of all of the above, like a custom blend of snuff. And a twist of pheramones thrown in.

I've *never* met a guy who smelled like cinnamon or honey, though I guess if he was a cook.

Mer

[mayphoenix.livejournal.com]

Well...it depends on what part of a man you're trying to describe. And then, all men are different. Just as all women are different. For instance -- I can always tell when my SO has been in the bathroom. Her body functions have a specific odor due to her diet and medications she takes. Lately, I've noticed a scent from me that reminds me of my granny; I just found out I may be looking at gall bladder removal (something she had trouble with).

African people have a particular musk. It's thick and oily. I believe it is excreted from the hair follicles, as their hair is very coarse (the scalp produces the oil to keep the hair from becoming brittle). It is not an unpleasant smell (to me, at least).

I have noticed in all the white men I'd dated that they all had a common scent around the genitals. It's hard to describe, but it's musky/tangy.

Natural male sweat (ie, armpits) tends to be more acidic than female. It has a sharper bite. The smell of a woman's armpit sweat often reminds me of an onion. When you throw in a deodorant, you're going to get that scent mixed in. I would suggest going to a men's cologne counter or to the men's deodorants in the store and sniff the different brands to get a good idea. Again, after application the scent will vary from person to person, depending on the reaction to the individual's body chemistry.

Hope this helps! :)

[isilya]

grease
oil
tar
petrol
sunscreen
shampoo
hair gel/wax (high end hair wax is often pineapple scented - don't ask me why)
shaving cream
seawater
coffee
clean skin
ironing starch
a t-shirt left out in the sun to dry

Don't forget you can always skew scent as well:

"Tom smelled wonderful, like a comfortable chair or a patch of sunlight."

Re:

[isilya]

I love your list, and it ties in with something I was reading about how our forebears are most emotionally connected to natural smells; baking, cut grass, manure, while we as a generation react most to chemical scents; chlorine, cologne, toothpaste, petrol.

[camillafarfalla.livejournal.com]

If, perchance, he's a smoker, there's a whole range - from the full gray gauzy (is that even a word?) taste of fresh smoke to the sour bite of stale cigarettes when it's been a while since he's had one. Also, hair gel. Go to a store and smell some men's gel and see what you come up with. *g*

Re:

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

*nods* I think it's partly associational. I've smelled manure maybe twice in my life, I've got nothing much to connect it to. Petrol brings back vivid sense memories of childhood, being crammed into the way back of a station wagon full of kids. That said, I still react to cut grass and baking.

Re:

[isilya]

Chlorine is one of my strongest punch-in-the-face smells. There's nothing like a whiff of chlorine to take me back ten years in a second.

Re:

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

African people have a particular musk. It's thick and oily.

Huh. That's not my experience. Though all of my African-American SOs have used hair care products that might have gotten rid of it, I guess.

Re:

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

Heh. Were you a swim team kid too, by any chance? Chlorine itself doesn't do much for me, but drying clorine on sun-warmed skin... yeah.

Re:

[mayphoenix.livejournal.com]

Very possibly. I do notice that my friend Douglas, who is bald, doesn't have that scent. (Actually, he wears a cologne that just gets me all kinds of turned on -- too bad he's gay and I'm a married Lesbian! *G*)

[al-riddle.livejournal.com]

Well, they smell faintly of whatever cologne or perfume they put on, with their own scent. I dunno. Like everyone's got some slightly different one.

They also smell like soap mixed with sweat. In a not smelly at all way.

:)

(okay fine. I can smell them all around me in class. whee)

[slumber.livejournal.com]

Thanks for all the help, guys! :D I came up with coffee-tasting last night, and I'm using Isilya's suggestion to skew description--he would smell like the world after a light rain, or something. All help much appreciated, and I'll be sure to keep this in mind for future reference. :)