Scents and Smells

312 Marbles

   After Ex-man dropped the kids off at my house today, I kissed my little son’s curly locks and noted the different smell - not shampoo but the smell of another person’s home.  “Your hair smells like your Dad’s place,” I said to him.  “Is that good or bad?” he asked me looking up.  “Neither,” I responded, “Just different.”  No longer the smell of our home together but a unique scent - no longer the smell of home. 
      Every home has a slightly different smell.  I find it a bit of olfactory overload in the hall of an apartment when I pick up scents from so many homes in such a small area.  Each home is a medley of scents including the colognes/shampoos/personal scents of the people living in it, the foods cooked/baked in the space, smoke, how alive/stagnant a space is, fresh flowers, cleaning supplies, incense, etc.  I remember being a kid and going over to friends’ houses and noting how they just didn’t smell like home. 
    Similarly, every person has a slightly different smell that can be a blend of personal scent, perfumes/colognes, shampoos, personal chemistry, foods eaten, etc.  What I’ve noticed each time that I’ve gotten into a new relationship is that there is a slight changes in my own personal smell - it’s like the two individual’s scents intermingle to create a new aroma unique to the relationship.  These are the slight changes that I have been aware of at a relationship’s inception that I have become accustomed to as time goes on.  Likewise when a relationship terminates, there is an untangling of the blend and a reclaiming of personal aromas. 
   I remember when Ex-man and I reunited in our twenties.  He was a smoker and despite the fact that I have never liked the smell of smoke, I started enjoying the scent of smoke on him (what sly trickery attraction can be).  As time went on, my natural inclinations reemerged and the smell of cigarette smoke became an annoyance.   Jennifer Aniston once said, “The best smell in the world is the man that you love.” It can be equally true that the worst smell in the world is the smell of the man whom you’ve just divorced because there’s no nerve more emotionally sensitive than the olfactory nerve. 

Nabokov once wrote, “Nothing revives the past so completely as a smell that was once associated with it.”  Consider your past life with your ex.  Are there scents that you remember fondly?  Are there those that evoke disdain?  What would it take to release the charge around those smells?  What would it take to get olfactory freedom from your past?