4.03.2006

nostalgia usually smells

has anyone ever heard that the sense of smell is very closely connected to memories? well, i have. a certain smell will bring back vivid memories of a time or person that the smell has been connected to in your mind. its usually unexpected, which makes it nicer, i think. but as i write this i realize it is difficult to bring back that same vividness without the smell to induce it. however, i can still remember a few that were brilliant enough to imagine long afterward.

i cant remember where it was, but i smelled chlorine recently and i was flooded with memories of my old house. my brother and i swimming in our pool, and wet hair in the summer sun.

with the grass beginning to grow again, neighborhoods are spotted with fresh cut lawns. this is one of my favorite smells and the memories that it summons are too many to recount. perhaps being sweaty, or sitting in the dried up creekbed.

almost painfully have i smelled the perfume of an old love and recalled memories of her. i am unfortunately attracted to wherever the smell came from. damn you, mass-produced victoria's secret girly fruit smell!

and just today my nostrils captured something i cannot quite categorize. there was a thunderstorm (understatement), a raspberry altoid, sweaty palms, and.....i cant remember. it was a mixture of smells along with the music i was hearing, i guess. i dont really know what it was, but it made me want to relish in some type of temporal lunacy. or maybe it wasnt lunacy, but rather.... love. its hard to tell the two apart these days.

i hope tomorrow i come across a blueberry pancake or a sticky pine tree or perhaps another thunderstorm.

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