Bohemian Rapsody

I visited a place on Main Street in Santa Monica today called Planet Blue, (310) 317-8566.

While my husband whined dramatically that "there was nothing in here", his idea of heaven is Frye's electronics or Pep boys - both of which make me feel like I am being deprived of oxygen; which in the case of Pep boys it's really true, as it is redolent with brain dissolving automotive fumes.

Such is not the case at Planet Blue where you can find the most unusual range of bohemian eclectica. There are boutique fragrances, cosmetics and skin polishers to put magic and wonder into your private world of the bath from Italy, France, and the United States. I doused myself in scents of amber, sake, and tobacco.

There are clothes worthy of a bohemian 70's star here, as well as earth mother offerings, nubby sweaters, and plush blankets to pamper the baby in all of us. The sixties and seventies never really left the Santa Monica regions of Main and Abbott Kinney.

Even if this is not your normal style, it behooves one to explore, maybe try on some things, as if you were exploring the grand attic of some dramatic aunt. This takes you out of your normal patterns and lets you look at clothes with more creative possibility. Clothes are more than just about dressing. They are also about costume. As such, they are a way of expressing yourself, or a mood, or a character you'd like to be for a night.

None of the senses are left out at Planet Blue. You can happily wile away an hour or so with childlike wonder, examining a photography book by the late Herb Ritts, or turning embossed river rocks over in your hands, feeling the weight, and imagining them strategically placed beside a plant in your home or lost amongst a pebble walkway, suddenly catching your eye and calling out for you to 'dream' to 'create', or to 'just be'.