blearyeyedme

On Smells

At some point this year, my wife and I tried a new fragrant soap from Bath & Body Works: Sea Island Cotton. I have just one word to describe the heavenly bliss in which my olfactory senses revel with each inhalation: Wow!

Over the years I’ve come to appreciate certain smells, especially those that bring back vivid memories and feelings associated with those smells. As a kid, I would love to play in the open field between my Grandparents’ home and my Aunt & Uncle’s in rural Ohio. The smell of the pigs, the dried mud flaking of their pink bodies; the chicken coup; the hay stacked high in the barn, its dust creating a sort of haze in the light shining in; the freshly cut grass, different from what we have here in south Florida, thinner and softer. But the most vivid of the smells is of my Grandparents’ home itself.

There have been two instances where these scents from Ohio have overtaken me completely:

1) I was working at PBCC one night, having to drive the 5-wheeler across an open field between two of our buildings, when the scent of the freshly cut grass in the field combined with the cane fields only several hundred feet away captivated me so that I continued riding in that field for another ten minutes, just so I could take in those smells for a little while longer.

2) In another instance at PBCC, I was checking all of the classrooms after hours, cleaning and locking up, when I entered this one classroom and the smell of Grandma and Grandpa’s house overwhelmed me. Just as I had done before, I sat down in the classroom and took in the aroma for at least ten minutes.

Similarly, the smell of Sea Island Cotton has now become my favorite smell, as it explicitly reminds me of Shannon and our stay in Las Vegas for our honeymoon. Our room at The Venetian smelled just like it. And even now, that smell always puts a smile on my face and makes me feel utterly complete.