I’ve heard that there’s a strong linkage formed in our brains by the combinations of inputs from multiple senses.
So often, especially with unusual stimuli like a particular scent, and old tune, maybe even the way the light is shining on something, I’ll have an instant flashback to something I wouldn’t have recalled if I had tried to. But that “sense memory” works to go almost automatically to that past event or situation.
In your own case is this sort of thing more likely to happen as a result of something you smell, hear, see, taste or touch?
And is whatever it is likely to recur whenever you encounter that same sensation?
BTW, if this out to go to another forum, no sweat here. But since mine is almost always sound/music related I suspect others will be giving music-related responses. (If it even gets any responses.)
I used to think that it was more likely to happen with sound, because I’m pretty music-centric. As time’s gone on though, it tends to be smell.
It’s the difference between remembering and transporting in my case. If I hear “Rikki Don’t Lose That Number,” I can recall the first time I heard it, walking around outside with a portable AM radio. However, if I smell a perfume that one of my exes used to wear, I practically relive that time all over again.
I recall things in both cases, but the intensity is much higher with smell.
In my case, it’s rarely a visual thing, and I don’t think my taste and touch senses are very acute – especially not to the point of that transporting you mentioned.
I’d say that my own responses are much as you’ve desribed. Old tunes draw back scenes. Example: when I was in high school I had a paper route that I delivered on my bike. Buddy Holly’s “Raining In My Heart” was big then and I would sing it to myself if it was raining. Now, if I hear that song (which isn’t all that often) I’ll go back to that whole scene/experience.
But catch a whiff of some aroma or scent and it’s almost instantaneously the feeling of the memory as opposed the reliving of it.
Thanks for helping to clarify a clumsy proposition!
Several years ago I noticed that a particular Elvis Costello song always seemed to pop into my head while I was preparing dinner. After I became conscious of how regularly of an occurance it was, I started wondering why that particular song was so strongly associated with food preparation for me-- it didn’t seem to make any sense, since the only mention of food in the song is a line about wedding cake, and overall it’s a dark song about obsession and betrayal.
After paying close attention for a week or so, I realized that the song always started running around in my head while I was chopping garlic, and then I realized that the association was purely verbal, and not a situational/Proustian sort of thing:
Garlic–> allicin --> Alison --> “Alison, I know this world is killing you. Oh, Alison, my aim is true,” rattles around in Mudd’s skull. Q.E.D.
It was wierd to realize what was happening almost mechanically in my subconsious to produce such a superficially inexplicable result.
Although certainly not that same train of thought (I had to check the link before understanding the allicin connection) but I have had similar semi-conscious links to become almost automatic. I can’t cite one offhand, but your description of the process is familiar.
Any song off of Pavement’s “Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain” album always brings me back to the summer I was 15 and driving to California with my cousins. Those songs scream “summer” and “fun” and “Ye gods, I wish I were back there right now” to me.
I agree. The scent of night air in summer (a mixture of honeysuckle, cut grass, green vegetation, asphalt, and moist soil) is my favorite scent in the scent universe – it never fails to make me completely tranquil and at peace with myself and the world when I smell it – probably because it subconsciously reminds me of all the summer evenings I spent playing in the woods as a child.
Or the smell of a rainstorm as it starts, that triggers the reliving of memories every time. That combo of just-now-wet pavement and dirt must be some kind of universal trigger, whether it’s a reminder of playing outside, or being on a field trip, or romance.
And we’re gonna get some rain today. You know, because I walk to work, I didn’t feel particularly lucky…until just now, reopening this thread.
If I can hijack my own thread, I’d like to ask if any of you have memories (maybe even dreams or fantasies) that compare with this one (more of a dream, I guess):
It’s late afternoon or early evening, just enough light to be able to see things. It’s raining softly, no wind. It’s cool enough for chill bumps, but not cool enough to put on more clothes. I’m at the mouth of a cave lookng out over a dense jungle-like expanse of vegetation. There’s a waterfall nearby so that all I can hear is that falling water. Behind me is a small fire in the cave, just enough to warm my back. I’m just sitting there, maybe hunkering on my heels, taking in the extreme joy of being totally at peace.