FROM RELIEVING athlete’s
foot to casing PMS, from
alleviating eczema to sooth-
ing migraines, Jacqui
McAndrew talks scents.

By Kate Zimmerman
Contributing Writer

McAndrew runs an aromathera-
py shop in Park Royal and believes
fully in the physical and emotional
benefits of laying on essential offs.

But she’s not competing with the
family doctor, McAndrew refers io
aromatherapy as “complementary
medicine,” intended to be used by
people who already take good care
of their bodies through exercise,
healthy food and a positive outlook.

Onc of those people is Vicki
Ritch, a photo counter clerk in a
drugstore who has a business side-

_line in reflexology and massage.
Ritch uses oils for massage, choos-
ing them according to whether her

“clients, for instance, have sore mus-
cles from playing sports or are suf-
fering from colds.

“T take a look af what's going on
in people's lives,” she said.

Ritch, one of McAndrew's rezu-
lar customers, is a firm believer in
the power of alternative medicine.

“E read up on a lot of things.” she
said. if a friend tells her she has a
headache, Ritch will take her hand
and manipulate her pressure points,

And she swears by the ability of
aromatic oils to affect moads. At
work, she said, she mixes up a
blend of water and oits that is “like
2 rejuvenation spray.”

“It lifts our spirits” Ritch
claimed. “If we're feeling burnt-out
or anything it picks us back up.”

Escents’s McAndrew wears a
tiny vial of her own favorite blend

Store your

| ALL
PHOTO
ALBUMS

(Belt, D&F,
| Burnes of ©
1 Boston

memories!

bee eat

aking scents

The aroma that surrounds you is believed to aid emotional and physical strength

ME es

NEWS phota Mike Wakefield

JACQUI MCANDREW samples the scent of a lit aroma candle in her Park Royal store, Escents
Aromatherapy. McAndrew refers to aromatherapy as “complementary medicine,” intended to be
used by peopie who already take good care of their bodies through exercise, healthy food and a

positive outlook.

of oils on a cord around her neck.

When she needs a whiff. she lifts’

the stopper. Others use scent dif-
fusers: cither the ceramic devices
warmed by a tea-light in their bas
or the electric ones, which swish
fragrance around a room.
McAndrew's store offers cus-
tomers orgunically-grown essential
oils in any quantity they want,
including by the drop. They can
come in, pick up one of the 10
books on aromatherapy on the
shelves, and look up the recipes for

cures for their ills.

A muscular ache, for instance,
can supposedly be relieved by rub-
bing in a compound made up of 10
drops of juniper, seven drops of
lavender and eight drops of rose-
mary. .

McAndrew maintains that the
oils Work on an emotional and it
physical level. She said a gust of
lavender oil helps bring the emo-
tions into balance, whether they are
righ or low. Applied to the body,
lavender oil is reputed to calm

Kodak
Film
100 ISO - 24 exposure

fancauve

783-3069

SWOEUnT

headaches, placate the symptoms of

PMS and mend skin irritations.
rashes, burns and insect bites.

“Pure favender on a burn stimu
fates the skin tissues,” McAndrew
said, adding thal the same scent
mixed into face creams helps them

in their rescue mission.

Mast essential oils are anti-bac-
terial, McAndrew said. They also
penetrate the bloodstream, and
some of them have astringent prop-
erties. ;

Actress Tina Gilbertson said
she's “a sucker for instant cures.”
She has been exploring aromathera-
py fora year and a half and has a
theary about oils.<"I think the rea-
son they work is they encourage
you to breathe deeply and regularly
and that always makes you feel bet-
ter”

Gilbertson is currently equipped
with an Essential Aromatherapy
inhaler infused with “Purity” fra-
grance, purchased al a drugstore. ,
She noted that of all the scents -
available, the one called Joy was the .
only one that was sold out, which”
gave her a small insight into what
society is curently seeking.

Gilbertson doesn't see aro-
matherapy as’ the savior of
humankind. “!_was feeling trauma-
lized yesterday so I sniffed it repeat-
edly and got a headache,” she
admitted.

So why use these
oils?”

“They smell good,” she suid sim-
ply. “It's a neat concept. The mar-
keting is really brilliant, § think.
(Aromatherapy) has a panacea
effect because we want to believe
something can make us feel calmer
and happy and healthy.”

McAndrew became interested in
aromatherapy about 2 %: years ago,
when she was selling perfumed oils

essential

See Nose page 39