explorations of Pogostemon cablin

I have a 16 oz bottle of dark patchouli from India that I’ve been hoarding for about six years. Aside from it making the opening of the bottle a bit tarry over time, it has aged into something really special. Golden, fruity, contemplative, green, herbaceous, dusty, sweet freshly-turned soil. All at once.

So I’m embarking on blends with it. I’ve so far tried the following in various combinations:
vetiver w/ rose
vanuatu sandalwood
morrocan rose
rose otto
gulhina
cocoa absolute
ylang ylang
choya ral
ruh motia
cassie
tonka
peru balsam

Nary a top note in those experimental blends, either. I find that patchouli either loses itself and you get something greater than the sum of the parts, or if you add enough, it creates a monotone of sorts. Not a bad monotone either, but the character really comes through.

I’m not one who thinks of the 1960s, or how my mom smelled in the several years after I was born, when I sniff patchouli. When I contemplate my bottle, I see a universal blender, an economic one even in light of current shortages driving the cost up. And for those naysayers who say that it leaves its grubby footprints in everything it is added to, nope. I know some very studied patchouli-haters who fail to detect it in a number of my perfumes where it plays a supporting role and adds green tones to render the leaves and branches the flowers are blooming from.