I’ve always loved beauty products. When I was a tweenager, I would go into a Victoria’s Secret, or a Bath and Body Works, and come out smelling like a very cheap, very young hooker. Rude, but true. I mean, what thirteen-year-old girl can resist rubbing something called “Amber Romance” into her skin and topping it off with a Strawberries and Champagne body spray? Not this one. My father spent years making it very well known that I smelled like an unbearable chemical hooker bomb. Every morning after my daily lotioning and spritzing routine, he would remark in a disgusted voice, “Oh, GOD, Have you been creaming again?” As a teenager, I thought he was being a real oversensitive Daddy Doofus, but as an adult, and as someone who’s struggled with chronic illness and chemical sensitivity (and, honestly, as someone who has inherited that same very sensitive Italian Dad Nose), I can tell you that stuff was simply no good. Have you ever tried to walk into one of those lotion-y, cream-y stores as a sensible Italian-nosed adult? Not to be dramatic, but it’s essentially like walking into chemical cupcake hell. Okay, that was dramatic — but, like, totally correct. […]