Tempore Donna Laura Biagiotti 1999

... a kiss is still a kiss
A sigh is just a sigh
The fundamental things apply
As time goes by..."

Time and again, these immortal lines from "Casablanca" come to my mind - especially when "Tempore Donna" wraps around my sense of smell.
And that, even though Ingrid Bergman was certainly not the woman I could imagine wearing this fragrance.
She was too brittle, too cool, too Nordic, too much of a lady as well.
It took me a while to trace this initially very confusing association - 13 years, to be precise.
"Tempore Donna" has been in my possession for that long, accompanying me through green and gray days, through confusions and chaos, through highs and lows, through great happiness and deep pain.
Thirteen long years.
And here we are now - as time goes by.

"Tempore Donna" is a woman, unequivocally and uncompromisingly.
Not a girl, not a princess, not a diva, not a vamp.
She does not just want to play, does not want to pass the time, does not longingly stare after a missed fairytale prince.
She smiles with a halo of light around her eyes, which shine, yet whose depth also bears witness to suffered pain.
She embraces, snuggles up, conveys a sense of security.
Her skin is warm, soft, and velvety, no longer as tight as it was back when the nights in the disco were long and it was straight from a quick shower to the office.
Today, she prefers cashmere and linen over bare skin.
Her beauty is not that of the model types on the catwalk - she loves her curves, which speak of sensuality and enjoyment, of generosity and zest for life, of spaghetti, Barolo, and tiramisu.
No man looks up to her, yet dozens of gazes follow her as she walks by.
She loves roses, dark, lush, magnificent roses - and daisies, the delicate little ones, for which no vase can be fine enough.
She does not giggle; she laughs - from the belly, joyfully and contagiously, and preferably at herself.
She likes children, and children love her, yet no one would think of seeing a mother hen in her.
She loves love and is aware of its transience, which is why she prefers to stand on her own two feet rather than on precarious Manolos.

A woman.
No Lilith, no Eve - this woman could not be created by God; she had to become.
Grow, seek, err, suffer, mature.
As time goes by.