I have heard it said that smell is our most powerful sense and the earliest to develop…
I saw this often with our babies as they could never sleep on freshly washed bedding, we would take a piece of our worn clothing and lay it in beside them and the fretful little one would settle down into peaceful slumber. This is a piece of advice I would pass on to every parent as it gives comfort to more than the baby. Sleep is a precious thing for moms and dads too. Baby powder has to be one of the best smells ever because it makes us think of when our babies were still babies. Baby powder has the unique ability to stop time and make us young again.
When we become older the responses to smells become more complex, freshly baked bread or apple pie might invoke hunger in some but to others it may take them away to another time and place or invoke powerful emotions.
The smell of fresh cinnamon buns always takes me back to when I was a child. Many a day was spent at my Aunt’s house in eager anticipation of the deliciously sweet buns that she made in great abundance and this memory takes me deeper yet. I remember the summer days I spent on the farm, playing in the haystacks with my brother and cousins building our fortresses of straw. We would play all day and then drag our tired little selves back to the farmhouse. The porch always smelled a little musty with a hint of manure and straw that never left. Passing through this would take you into the kitchen where the smells were guaranteed to delight and make you forget the moments you spent the porch.
Chicken roasting in the oven, freshly baked bread and buns glazed with freshly churned butter. Potatoes steaming in the pot, the peppery smell of perfect gravy, and the smell of fresh vegetables both raw and cooked. I cannot forget the homemade garlic pickles either. Upon sensing this our fatigue would be lifted in anticipation of a delicious repast. I talked to my Aunt tonight, she makes me think of hot cinnamon buns, fresh cream and freshly churned butter.
My grandfather always smelled of sawdust, he was a master craftsman and maker of furniture. To be allowed into his workshop meant that one had to sit still and not touch anything unless permission was given. Quite often he smelled like earth as his garden was another passion. I cannot cut into a piece of wood without thinking of him and the things he so patiently taught me. Besides the sawdust and dirt he smelled fresh, I think it was Old Spice cologne that he wore.
My grandmother had her own special smell, to sit on her lap meant that you would be enveloped in this warmth, she always smelled like the bread she baked every day and there was somthing else, a hint of something perfumed and sweet. I would detect this scent when I would go to wash up but it took me years to find out what this smell was. Now people look at me funny when I shop because really, what kind of loon would stand in the aisle and smell the soap? (I did this very thing this afternoon). That’s what it was dear readers, Dove soap. She would save the chips and put them into a little basket above the sink as she was never one to waste anything. The smell triggers bittersweet memories as it seems like only yesterday that I would sit down in their kitchen and snack on cheese and crackers, smoked fish, and the the homemade raspberry jam my grandfather made. We’d complement these meals with cup after cup of sweet aromatic tea.
They’re gone now and all I am left with is a wealth of good memories that are often triggered by sawdust, soap, or freshly baked bread. If you see a guy sniffing soap in the aisle looking like he might cry… that’s me.
I liked naps ever since I was a child.There is nothing like crawling under the covers to smell the sheets that only a little earlier were hung out on the line to dry. This is a smell that Lola doesn’t like, perhaps because her sheets always smelled like traffic. So we compromise and put them in the dryer and then they don’t really smell right until Lola has slept on them. I remember the first time she ever slept over and how reluctant I was to wash the pillowcases because they smelled like her.
Don’t even get me started on coffee, dark roasted and freshly ground is the only way to go.
It would be an understatement to say I have a well developed sense of smell. As I type this I can smell Lola as she was when she came from the shower, fresh and warm with a hint of flannel. The little girl who just fell asleep on lap is what’s kept me from getting to bed for the second night in a row. She smells good, baby fresh with a hint of the Doritos she was snacking on before sleep claimed her.
I just tucked her in, after reading and writing this I decided to wrap her in her blanky as her sheets just got washed yesterday. That’s probably why she has had such a tough time sleeping, her bed didn’t’t smell right to her.
