Poetic smells

[lizzytysh]

Hi Diane ~

Yes, many of those grandmothers of ours had some pretty sturdy, conventional wisdom to offer. I was thinking of camping, too ~ where, if you don't apply the 5-second rule, many a meal could go uneaten. Your experience with the frying bacon was one such .

~ Lizzy

[Tchocolatl]

Sometimes I randomly dip into the dusty vaults of this forum to see what you good people were talking about in the past. The other day I was reading an interesting thread about poetic sounds and that gave me the idea to start this one about smells...!

Here we are enjoying the beginning of autumn, so I'll kick off with some seasonal ones:

- the aroma of blackberry pie, baking in the oven
- the fresh smell of damp air filling the nostrils first thing in the morning
- the 'mellow, fruitful' smell coming from dense wet hedgerows
- the heady scent of fresh lavender crushed in the hand and inhaled

What smells do you love?

Diane

Strictly autumn smells speaking (otherwise the list is too long) and I don't know if it is poetic or pleasant or if you used those two words as synonyms, or what, but, in any case :

The scent of automn leaves on the ground and the scent of the soil. The scent of cold air and vegetation mixed together. But those smells are indissociable from the particular quality of light and sounds of fall. So soft light (lilac sky, pink golden air) and soft sounds (round sounds). And from the colours : very fauvist period time of the year in this regard, contrasting to all this softnest of the rest. This, because the smells have the power to bring back images and sounds instantly, as we all know.

[lizzytysh]

Even though I, long ago, quit smoking, there's something about the smell of a cigarette being smoked in the cool, night air of autumn. Perhaps, it's because it takes me [instantly, of course] to being with my boyfriend, the love of my life, when I was in high school, at nighttime, football games with him, as we huddled together, with me helping block the cool wafting of air, for him to get his cigarette lit. Geez. Just thinking back on how I felt during those times .

[Vince]

The aroma of a cigar
good wine
poker room
old books
ink
woman

not always in that order

[lizzytysh]

Hi Diane ~

And, along the [somewhat ] same lines, comes a saying from South Africa, showing that it holds true there, too:

**• **South Africa - **If you are looking for a fly in your food it
means that you are full.

Thought you'd appreciate it.

~ Lizzy

[Tri-me]

Leather is awesome!! Had a ride on a friend's HOG today, he gave me a leather jacket to wear, the smell of the leather is lingering in my nose.

The smell of the lilacs in the spring is uplifting. In the fall the smell chimneys and just how clean and crisp the air is. Fall is so beautiful, the leaves are turning slowly this year.

Isn't the sulphur the icky stuff that goes up your nose from a match, isn't that why it is polite for a man to light his cigarette, then the woman's when using a wooden match??

[Vince]

It's unladylike
for a woman to smoke.

[lizzytysh]

The sulphur smell [that I called carbon] is the smell after you've blown out the match and see the puff of smoke. I guess it's sulphur . I think [maybe?] in the lighting process, it might be the heat from the match heating the inside of your nose, and whatever attendant smells that might bring ?

Good heavens, sure makes smoking sound appealing, doesn't it !?!

However, great time to add [w/o an edited line ] that in my smoking scenario, my boyfriend was the only one smoking at that time. I didn't start until after I graduated from high school.

I'm not sure of the whys and wherefores of the cigarette-lighting etiquette and how they came to be.

~ Lizzy

[lizzytysh]

Yes, Ghoti ~ Our chicken coop was in the back yard, too. A really nice one, in fact, that my Dad built. It had a regular height-and-width, thick door, and was well-insulated, with a couple windows. I remember going in there for eggs, and just to hang out with the chickens.

Then, another memory is from when I was about 12. We drove up into the mountains from out of Gallup, New Mexico, winding up hairpin curves far up to where Johnny, a distant cousin of my mother lived. Johnny and Annie had no electric, and drank from a well. They had a variety of farm animals, including of course, our star, the chicken . Many of them. I loved gathering eggs, and it would always take awhile to do it just because there were so many. I loved the smell of being out in the barnyard.

This evokes another poetic-smell memory. Green, Palmolive soap. I took a bath by candlelight and that was the kind of soap they had. To this day, whenever I smell that kind of soap, I'm still lying in that tub, looking up at the candle, thinking what a wonderful life they have [had] up there. But, then, what does a 12-year-old know ? They seemed to like it, though .

[evelyn]

when I was a child, the smell of vinyl in a store, indicating where
the toy department was

and recently, a designer soap labeled "vanilla", which actually
smelled like Play Doh

the sweet smell of my cats' fur, the putrid smell of her breath when she yawns

evelyn

[Ghoti]

The sulphur comes from the initial burst of flame in a match... I don't know if it is commonly thought of as a pleasant smell but I like it anyway, the intensity... just one quick strong smelling whisp of smoke.

[Tri-me]

A friend of mine ended up in a mental hospital, when I went to visit him he smelled of Irish Spring soap, eek a mouse I am very uncomfortable with that smell now. I love the smell of this Lavender stuff my grandmother would bring back from England. It was in a small square brick and dissolved in the bath water, it came in a fancy tin box I think.

[lizzytysh]

Ah! Your lavendar cube triggers another scent memory of mine, Tri-me. Subtle, yet distinctive to me, when I smell it. It's also for the bath. Those egg-shaped or round, rubbery-feeling and differently coloured, vibrant, jewel-toned capsules, containing bath oils. Even now, I first press them to my nose to smell before putting them in the bath. I also like to let the warm water make them lose their elasticity, until they finally pop, when I press on them. I guess it's a tactile memory, too, huh .

[Diane]

Yes, thanks for that South African saying, Lizzy, it's so true. Since the bacon incident, I've done quite a bit of mountain biking, and involuntarily eaten a whole lot more dirt, but, as the saying goes "it never did me any harm".

Mmmm, this is a nice part of the forum; reminds me of wandering around one of those 'hand made soap' shops like Lush - bursting with delicious aromas.

Tchoc, I like the way you evoke the feel of autumn. It is a soft and mellow time of the year.

Evelyn: play doh, mmm, yes. Anybody remember those purple-coloured little sweets called parma (or palma) violets that smelt perfumey? The smell (and the taste), was quite sickly, but it does remind me of childhood...

Diane

[lizzytysh]

Mountain biking. I've been meaning to comment on that, Diane. Wonderful . I've never done it, and at this point won't, but the photos I see always have such a look of hard-earned exhiliration and joy.

Lush is one of the stores I had wanted to visit while in England, but that among many other wishes need to wait for a return trip .

Those little sweets that you describe sound like something [maybe] from the other side of the pond . They don't even ring a bell.

~ Lizzy