10 Scents from My Young Life
1. Saffron in Grandma’s pot pie Grandma used burnt-orange threads of saffron from a white packet. Mine comes in a tiny glass jar from Homegoods, more expensive, of course.
2. Tomatoes on vine in our Bainbridge, Pennsylvania field
Mother in her sunbonnet bending over to pick ripe tomatoes. Image from home video, 1950s
3. Lilac blooms on Grandma’s bushes
4. Aunt Ruthie’s peonies (YouTube video)
5. Mom’s Chocolate-coated Easter candy
6. New dress smell
7. Box of crayons All the crayons smelled waxy, but my nose told me scarlet smelled different from turquoise. I also loved to stick my nose into a new book, inhaling the pages–especially on the first day of school.
8. Scent of sheets and towels smelling fresh on clothesline
9. Mother’s Angel Food Cake Hot from the Oven. She whipped the egg whites to soft peaks to make a cake of perfect delight.
Google image
10. New-car smell inside Dad’s new Dodge,1965 Polara Google image
Scents and Memory
Tasha Marks in her Studio Interview from The Guardian
Back in 2013, shortly after I started blogging, I published a post about scent and our memories. In the post entitled “Feeling Rich, in Touch with Our Senses,” I explored the writing of Diane Ackerman and her landmark book, A Natural History of the Senses. She says that the sense of smell is “the most immediate of all our senses” because the olfactory nerve, which processes smell, has a direct connection to the part of the brain that controls our memories. Have a look!
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Author Brooke Warner, mentor and publisher, advises writers to “Make Your Prose Crunchy. Take advantage of the under-used sense of taste and smell, she says. Check it out!
2 Let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
It has to be fresh bread baking, the fresh smell of washing and like you, Marian… Lilacs…I still love the smell of fresh bread baking and the smell of fresh washing the lilacs have been replaced by Jasmine and although I rarely ever drink coffee I love the smell of fresh coffee…
Oh, YES! Bread baking!!!!
Carol, I think we like similar smells from days of yore. . . and even now!
I can understand why you like the sweet smell of jasmine, now living in Thailand. Thank you! 😀
Yes Jasmine is very popular here it’s used when making the Phuang Malai which are hung in taxis,Tik tuks ,buses and cars plus they are used as offerings to Buddha. They are not just decorative but have cultural and spiritual significance here in Thailand.
Good morning, Marian! I’ve read about museums with scents and studying the senses–and of course, that fascinates. Places in the past must have smelled so different. And people (eww!). I think my number one scent from childhood memory–and still a favorite, is the scent of coffee brewing. I often take note of what I’m smelling when I go out walking. I love when I smell honeysuckle.
Merril, you’re ahead of the game, knowing about museums with scents, although I have known about the study of scents when Diane Ackerman’s book was published.
I love the scene of honeysuckle too. I wonder if that is blooming in New Jersey. 😀
I may have heard something on NPR awhile ago. I remember researching it.
I’m pretty sure it blooms all summer here, but I really notice it early in the summer.
Thanks, Merril.
You’re welcome!
The smell of something baking in the oven, bread, pies, cakes etc. are my favourite childhood smells. And still are.
Darlene, I know you enjoy baking, and I’ll bet you find it a refreshing change from writing. Besides, you get immediate edible rewards for your effort. 😀
😋
Cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg are smells that can send me back to my childhood quicker spaceship. Especially if I am reading a book or listening to music that I love, I have a sense of belonging.
Shalom shalom
Pat, all those spices have pungent aromas. “A sense of belonging” is an added bonus. Thanks for adding this! 😀
Such a fun post, Marian! When I was a kid, I loved the new car smell, the smell of my mother’s pound cake in the oven, and cinnamon and bayberry at Christmas. My mother favored Estee Lauder’s Youth Dew Parfum Spray. The scent of it would fill a room. I also recall my dad’s Old Spice after shave.
I couldn’t mention the Christmas tree scent because we had no tree, but I enjoying the scent of Fraser Fir in our house in December.
For quite a while I wore Estee Lauder’s Youth Dew. My mother used Evening in Paris on special occasions, as I recall. You’re igniting more memories here, L. Marie! 😀
I’m glad! 😄 Mom had a tiny bottle of Anais Anais perfume. The house smelled like that fragrance for three solid days.
I’m familiar with that fragrance too!
Hi Marian,
Yes-the smell of a crayon box brings me back. And play doh, new school notebooks, and mom’s perfume.😊
Ah, play doh! When my kids played with it, I sunk my nose into the soft mass a time or two. It’s good to hear from you, Kim! 😀
Whenever I pick a tomato off a vine I inhale deeply and whisper “Tante Sara!” In Paraguay to grow most things was labor intensive but Tante Sara, who lived at the end of the village had the best garden! In Asuncion, where we stayed for a couple of months waiting for our visas to Canada, the smell of roses and bananas takes me back there at once.
I could go on and on…Thanks for this interesting blog post, Marian!
You’re welcome, Elfrieda. And what a great illustration about your “Tante Sara”!
Diane Ackerman says that our sense of smell has a direct connection to the limbic system, the part of the brain that controls emotions and memory. Your recollection of aromas in Paraguay is a perfect example. Thanks again. 😀
The fact that people can study and become professional scent designers is fascinating to me, Marian. I loved the article you shared. And on top of that, she is re-creating smells from medieval times! That’s crazy ingenious and makes me want to visit the museum, haha. And I also love your return to childhood through your own scent memories. What a great post. The first one that came to mind for me is opening the jar of mint jelly for our lamb dinners and walking into our local bakery. Oh, and the perfume of my best friend’s mom; the things you remember! Thanks so much, Marian. 💕
Melanie, I like your memory of mint jelly and also the fresh baked smell.
I knew nothing about the scent “industry” depicted here and never heard of Tasha Marks before researching this post, so I’m discovering this along with you. Thanks! 😀
I’m still working on other scent memories in my mind….😊 So interesting!
I wonder if a new blog post is brewing. . . your own adaptation. Hmmmm?
Ha! You never know….😀
Great topic for blogging. I identified with all your memories as well as the ones in the comments. Smell is almost impossible to describe definitively. And what is evoked often depends on memory. What is easier is to describe the impact it has on people and animals. I am preparing for a dinner party today. Will hope to make the smells both savory and sweet.
You also may remember the smell of tobacco in the stripping room, a sharp scent I recall from Uncle Landis’ barn.
I’d love to inhale the savory scents in your kitchen this afternoon. Your guests are very fortunate, Shirley! 😀
I remember many of the same scents from my childhood as you do. I would add to your list honeysuckle and creosote, which I still love. I love the work Tasha Marks is doing! Historically accurate scents would add so much to the museum experience.
Liz, I can identify with honeysuckle, but I associate creosote with white “paint” as a preservative on fencing. I didn’t realize it has a pleasant scent. Now I’ll have to find a fence with creosote–haha! Thanks for the enlightenment. 😀
I encountered the smell of creosote on telephone poles and railroad ties.
Oh, I think I remember the dark “skirts” on telephone poles!
They’re the ones!
Most anything in Grandma’s kitchen, but I especially loved her homemade cinnamon buns always pungent when fresh from the wood cook stove.
Elaine, I think the wood cook stove must have added an extra “tang” to the baking process, like cinnamon buns as you mention. Thanks for the memory! 😀
New books and fig trees.
Like you, I dearly love new books. However, I’m not certain that I could identify the aroma of a fig tree. We had one in our back yard, but it didn’t survive.
In the States, fake fig trees of all sizes are used in home decor. Thanks for adding this, Fatima. 😀
Great post connect. Ah when life smelled new.
Thank you, “Barefeetbarista”!
Hi Marian, I love your list of childhood smells memories. I would add vanilla essence, baby powder and gingerbread.
Oh, I forgot vanilla extract! That has to make my list too. I like to bake and always enjoy that when it’s one of the ingredients, as in chocolate chip cookies.
ROBBIE, I not surprised that you like vanilla essence and gingerbread because they come from the kitchen. Baby powder is a little surprising, but nice–maybe you associate the powder with a contented baby! 😀
I like your list Marian, because it’s from specific memories of your childhood. I don’t know that I can come up with the. Some of my favorites are baking bread, pizza in the oven, cinnamon, scented candles, and mint. I can’t help noticing that many of these are associated with edibles.
Well, Pete, we never bake our own pizza, but I use cinnamon in so many dishes. And of course, scented candles and mint, which I grow in our lanai, along with basil and thyme. Thanks for adding variety to the list! 😀
Lilac trees wafting through the air when walking to school. And I do love the smell of iris and jasmine. Amazing how certain scents just take us backl 😍
Obviously, you agree with Diane Ackerman, who tells us our noses give us a direct connection to memory. Lilac and jasmine are easy to access for me, but I don’t remember the scent of Mom’s irises. Hmm. . . .
🙂
Fab post!
Many of your smells are mine. Grandma’s Lilacs, hanging laundry… and her home cooking (pies, cabbage rolls and chicken soup). Thank you, Marian!
You’re welcome, Resa. It sounds like you have sensational memories! 😀
Thank you Marian!
Yes… I’m one of those who has detailed memories of the past, but can never remember where I put my keys. 😂
Ha!
But what you can remember serves you well! 😀
Yes it does! 😄
We were poor when I was a kid, Marian! We were one of the four tenents on a long flat. There’s a bakery on our block in Hong Kong. I remember getting fresh bread from the bakery. New clothes! Yes, we got new clothes for Chinese New Year, so it was a special smell in a special occasion. My dad loved to treat us with red bean soup with brown sugar. I remember the smell of brown sugar. I make red bean soup once in a while. Probably I can get fresh bread (croissant) from Costco. For new clothes, I always wash the new clothes before wearing it. Some labels recommend doing it also.
Thank you so much, Miriam!
I enjoy learning about you and look forward to hearing/reading even more.
From this note, I get the impression that you found a way to thrive in spite of your early experience just to survive. 😀
Chocolate chip cookies in the oven. Definitely. But not in childhood, because my mom didn’t bake cookies. Just cakes. So I started baking cookies from 13 on. Vanilla. Roses. However, in the past decade, scents scare me. So many perfumes (women wear, or that you smell on someone’s clothes or walking past a too-perfumed store) make me nauseous. I’ve become so sensitive to smells. So I buy essence of peppermint oil and essence of lavender oil and they help settle my stomach. I also use the peppermint on drying balls that give my clothes a fresh minty scent.