Happy Clinique 1997 Perfume

It took me years to muster up the courage to test Clinique HAPPY. It's possible that I finally did it only because of my conversion to true love for AROMATICS ELIXIR--against all expectations. I had no specific reason for believing that I'd hate AROMATICS ELIXIR beyond the flagrant contradiction that a fragrance-free skin care company should produce a notoriously powerful perfume, but I had read so many songs of praise written by so many perfumistas whose opinions I respect, that I finally tried that creation and feel shortly thereafter in love. I now own two bottles, one made in the United States and the other made in Switzerland, and both of them smell great, once one gets past the bitter chamomile opening.

With HAPPY, I had some serious baggage to deal with and barriers to surmount. Several years ago my sister sent me one of her generous gift packages filled with ceramics (she's an artist) and various snack items and usually a couple of random and unpredictable "things". In this particular package, she had also "thrown in"--just in case I might want them--about five or six Clinique HAPPY minis which she had accumulated from gwps but did not use. She warned me that, in her view, the true name of HAPPY should be MISERABLE.

I stowed the minis away among a bunch of others and swiftly forgot about them. When I began reviewing perfumes in December 2009, I noticed that the Clinique company does a pretty good job of distributing samples of HAPPY, because I always seem to be finding them, and each time they remind me of the minis, and each time I remember why I never really want to sample this perfume.

On this historic night, with a hot bath on the horizon, I took out one of the fresh samples of HAPPY and sprayed it on. In a moment's time, I realized that my sister was right. This is just horrible. It smells like orange cleaning products to me, not all-natural orange-scented cleaning products, but foul-smelling orange Windex.

Based on the reviews I've seen, HAPPY seems to be a fairly polarizing composition, with people generally lining up in either the love or the abhorrence camp. So I am aware that this fragrance has its fans, and my guess is that this particular combination of chemicals is quite compatible with some people's physiological constitution, and according to them, HAPPY is an excellent citrus scent. To me and those of my ilk, this smells like the emanations from an organic chemisty lab and so off-putting that I just want to wash it off.

My sister and I are similar in many ways, and I have to say that I agree in this case, that wearing Clinique HAPPY is not a pleasant experience at all. I cannot say that I feel miserable, but unhappy might be a fair assessment of the effect of this fragrance on me.

Now It's time for that bath...