Scentless
How much do you remember?
My mother told me about the candy I used to hoard as a toddler and how I hid in the stairwell behind the pot plant so that I could eat my candy without being caught or having to share. I don’t remember that part, but 25 years later when I went back to that apartment block where I’d lived until I was three, I recognised the smell of that stairwell immediately.
I stood in the street and closed my eyes and the memories came flooding back. The hedge by the big cement bin holders which had little white flowers that we used to pluck and jump on. They were filled with air and would reward us with tiny little popping sounds. The cement bin holder itself that we’d climb up on and pretend we were giants. The little playground across the street that in my memories was so much larger given that I was so much smaller when I last saw it.
We left there and I remember the years we lived in Western Samoa with similar clarity. I remember sitting on the pools edge and watching my sister and brother swim. I remember desperately wanting to jump in and finally doing so. I remember my brother goading me from the shallows telling me just how lovely it was, but reminding me that I wasn't allowed in without Mum. We argued:
You’ll get in trouble
No I won’t
Mum will smack you
Soooo
Go on then, I dare you
Alright then, I will …
And plop, in I went. My brother instinctively moved toward me, but I was already doggy paddling and although I stayed in the shallows I was pleased to know that I could swim with the big kids now.
It’s funny the things I remember. The smells that revive my memories like electric shocks. Cinnamon and Ginger suddenly remind me of candles on trees and snow on the streets. Perfume that I wore at the end of a bad break-up and the memories that make me furrow my brow and shake my head in an attempt to forget.
And then there are the ones I love the most that strangely have no aroma at all. Those that I’ve spent a life time with and too many days without, but whose memories come to me in words and actions rather than wafts of scent. They are the ones I need no prompts to remember. They are scentless because they are me. They are my life.
My mother told me about the candy I used to hoard as a toddler and how I hid in the stairwell behind the pot plant so that I could eat my candy without being caught or having to share. I don’t remember that part, but 25 years later when I went back to that apartment block where I’d lived until I was three, I recognised the smell of that stairwell immediately.
I stood in the street and closed my eyes and the memories came flooding back. The hedge by the big cement bin holders which had little white flowers that we used to pluck and jump on. They were filled with air and would reward us with tiny little popping sounds. The cement bin holder itself that we’d climb up on and pretend we were giants. The little playground across the street that in my memories was so much larger given that I was so much smaller when I last saw it.
We left there and I remember the years we lived in Western Samoa with similar clarity. I remember sitting on the pools edge and watching my sister and brother swim. I remember desperately wanting to jump in and finally doing so. I remember my brother goading me from the shallows telling me just how lovely it was, but reminding me that I wasn't allowed in without Mum. We argued:
You’ll get in trouble
No I won’t
Mum will smack you
Soooo
Go on then, I dare you
Alright then, I will …
And plop, in I went. My brother instinctively moved toward me, but I was already doggy paddling and although I stayed in the shallows I was pleased to know that I could swim with the big kids now.
It’s funny the things I remember. The smells that revive my memories like electric shocks. Cinnamon and Ginger suddenly remind me of candles on trees and snow on the streets. Perfume that I wore at the end of a bad break-up and the memories that make me furrow my brow and shake my head in an attempt to forget.
And then there are the ones I love the most that strangely have no aroma at all. Those that I’ve spent a life time with and too many days without, but whose memories come to me in words and actions rather than wafts of scent. They are the ones I need no prompts to remember. They are scentless because they are me. They are my life.
posted by Teaine at 8:42 AM
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