Body spray

Trevor is not a morning person. He is all teen and male teen at that. Coming home from school, waking in the morning, he smells locker room male. It's in his gene pool. My dad was a two shirt a day guy to avoid the odor. I tell Trevor to bath every day.

Some nights Trev will stay up and read late. This makes getting up a challenge. He wakes ready to fight. He will argue with anyone over anything. Firstly, he wants to argue over the need to take a shower. I have to get cranky to force the issue.

The other day, though, I did not hear the water running for the shower. Trevor came out of the bathroom reeking of body spray. It was a gift from his Grandma at Christmas. Little did she know how he would abuse it. I could smell the cologne in my bedroom with Trevor in the kitchen downstairs. He was already dressed and making him go back upstairs to shower would also make him miss his bus to school. I let him go, but couldn't imagine the smell of that cologne in the closed space of the bus. It is winter and cold, and I could imagine seeing every window being forced open as Trevor sits down in a seat.

This week, Trevor was off to pep band for a performance during a basketball game. I had to drop him off. While in the car with me, sitting in the front seat, he lifted his arm to scratch his nose. I received a whiff of underarm odor, no anti- perspirant. He had forgotten to put on deodorant again. I warned him of the smell. His response was to tell me not to worry he had his handy bottle of body spray in the outside pocket of his backpack at his feet. I tell him to use it in moderation, after he gets out of my car. Spray underneath the shirt to control and minimize the strong smell.

Oh, no, this is wonderful body spray he informs me. The proper way to use it is to hose your whole body in a misty fog. I was just grateful he did it after he got out of the car. I wailed at him to quickly shut my car door so I didn't choke on the fumes. I drove out of the mist as quickly as I could.

He tells me he has been spraying his PE clothes so he doesn't have to bring them home to wash. I have visions of the clothes standing up all by themselves. He said Coach makes you bring the clothes home to wash if they stink. If you forget to bring the clothes back , he docks you points each day you don't have the proper uniform. Trevor doesn't want to take the chance that he might forget to bring the clothes back if he takes them home to wash. His option is to saturate them in incredibly strong body spray cologne until all other odors are masked completely.

I can't imagine he is alone in this vicious plan to kill the olfactory senses of the coach, and anyone within a three to five room radius. I would probably put Vick's under my nose to cover the sent in the locker room, like going into an autopsy of a week old cadaver.

This morning, I stood outside the bathroom door just to make sure the boy did use water. I checked all the clothes on the floor of his room for odors and tossed in the laundry hamper those that needed washing and hung up the clean stuff.

I did the same in Riley's room sorting the piles of laundry that needed washing from the piles of clean laundry that had been dumped on the floor instead of being properly hung up. There will now be plenty of laundry for us to do over the weekend. The boys can help put away the new clean clothes that I collected to wash.

I just can't help cringing and crinkling my nose at the thought of the smells in that school locker room full of teen boys and excessive body spray. Hopefully Trevor doesn't run into any one with allergies or he'll put them in a coma. No wonder paint always seems to be pealing off the walls and ceilings in locker rooms. The air is toxic.