I found myself in Walmart this morning in the cleaning aisle with my nose pressed to all the different fabric softener sheet selections. I’m sure I elicited a few strange and curious stares. But I didn’t care. I was out of sheets and my laundry was suffering from some serious static cling.
Why not just grab a box of Bounce and be on my way? Well, you see, I have a super sensitive nose. The smell goes in and makes a bee-line to the memory part of my brain and pounds on the door. And the smell of Bounce makes my stomach churn and nausea washes all over me.
Have you ever been going about your day, minding your own business when, WHAM! you’re hit with a smell that triggers a memory and you’re transported back in time to a certain experience and you have to take a moment just to remember? Details come back to you and you can just picture the setting, hear the sounds, see the people, and remember how you felt. That happens to me all the time.
Perhaps I have control issues but I have to smell products before I buy them. Like shampoo. Once, I switched shampoos without an initial sniff test only to be transported back to my junior high swim team locker room. I could smell the chlorine, feel my aching muscles, see my portly mustached coach and prepubescent teammates, and hear the whistles and hollers from the parents in the stands. Please, give me back my Nexxus.
Some other smells that elicit a serious case of memories are:
Bounce and garlic – Not necessarily together. Can you imagine? Shoot me on the spot if that happens! Let me explain. Pregnancy. Nausea. Morning Sickness. I equate Bounce and garlic breath with early pregnancy. To this day, both smells trigger the gag reflex. If we’ve been out of town and have done laundry where Bounce has been used, I have a really hard time loving on the kids. I have to go home and rewash everything to get rid of the horrid stench of Bounce! And garlic? Well let’s just say, if one person eats it, we all have to indulge.
Coffee - Reminds me of my very first “real job at East Side Manor in Fayetteville, New York, an assisted living home where I helped in the kitchen. I can see those cute old people sitting around in the lobby waiting for some excitement. I can see the head cook’s massive calves sticking out of her nylon socks and white medical shoes. I can hear “They Built This City on Rock and Roll” playing Every.Single. Night as we were clearing and resetting the tables, washing the dishes, and refilling the creamers. The memory of ginger snaps and ginger ale comes into play here as well. Nightcap anyone?
Lysol Disinfectant Spray original scent - When we finally brought Jack home at 4 weeks-old, after his first open heart surgery, we were ultra paranoid about germs, understandably. A trip to Costco resulted in an entire case of this spray. We spent the day before he came home spraying every inch of our house. Gone were smells of potpourri, last night’s meal, bubble bath, baby powder, laundry detergent. All you could smell when stepping foot in our house was Lysol. We used every last drop of that spray for the first couple months we had Jack and a couple months after his second surgery. To this day, the smell of that stuff reminds me of fear, newfound love, late night medicating, little Maddy in pigtails, playing hour after hour of Memory with her while we were stuck in the house, trips to and from Oakland Children’s Hospital, beeping from the O2 monitor, feeding pump, and apnea monitor. Jack’s heart issues have been relegated to the back burner, thankfully, as has the Lysol. I now buy anything BUT Lysol.
The Trifecta of green peppers, onions, and ground beef cooking - takes me back to my childhood. My sister and I sitting in front of the TV in our cozy tudor in Kalamazoo, Michigan watching The Brady Bunch while my mom makes dinner in the kitchen waiting for my dad to get home from work. That scene flashes in my memory every time I cook those things together now. I equate that smell with home and comfort.
Moth balls and wet dog – Reminds me of my childhood friend Katie Burns’ house. We spent hours playing school and house there. Her basement always smelled of moth balls. She had a black scottish terrier with skin issues. He had scratched patches of fur off his hide leaving bald patches of skin. He must have required lots of baths because I remember often smelling wet dog when I was over. These days wet dog can be smelled here as well since Molly makes the unfortunate choice of frequenting the cow pasture at least once a week. Oh how I love dogs…
As I was laying in bed the other night I was making a mental list of smells that trigger distinct and strong memories. I could go on and on in detail but I’ll leave that for nonpublic writing venues. But here’s a brief list:
- Seaweed
- Old Spice
- cigarette smoke masked with Airwick
- Mustela baby products
- hospitals
- spray adhesive
- Big Red gum
- Anais Anais and Lauren perfume
OK. Your turn. What smells elicit a serious memory jog for you?
Excellent post. I love that picture!!!
The smell of coffee reminds me of Sunday lunch at my grandma’s house. I hate that smell. I would have to sit outside on the swing until it went away
I have Lysol issues too… but not quite as intense! Such a fun post – I just had to come by from SITS to see a post with the title “now smell this”
Burts bees apricot oil reminds me of all my babies – I’ve used it on all the kids when they were babies!
your last two fragrances………college, circa 78-82, my two fragrances of choice.
Most Johnson’s baby products and Dreft….when my babies were small.
White Shoulders–my mom always wore it when my parents were going out to a party…..not often.
Pine Sol…….ick, my aunt over used it in her bathrooms, it still makes me sick.
coconut oil………reminds me of Hawaiian tropic sun tan oil, no sunscreen……but in the 70′s and 80′s it’s what all we sunbathing/precancerous loving girls were using. I’m reminded of a roof of a dorm at the University of Missouri………great scent!
Stopping by from SITS, your blog is very nice!!
Roses remindme of my mom. I love her, but not a big fan of the scent. Weird?
Bleach = clean in my brain and honeysuckle reminds me of my childhood every time.
Happy SITS day!
The one that pops into my mind is the smell of the NICU soap. My husband and I would come home after leaving our sweet newborns at the hospital and sniff our hands b/c that reminded us of them. There was no baby powder smell but there was soap. Ahhh, I still love that smell and always use some when we see specialists for the boys.
My biggest smell memory is walking in Albertsons pregnant with my first son and smelling bleach from the meat department. To this day if a store smells like this I cover my nose and RUN!
Right now it’s just goat gas. Lots and lots of goat gas….
*sigh*
Happy SITS day…
Great post.
Caress soap, Tide and Downy all remind me of my Grandma.
)
With this pregnancy, I cannot handle men’s cologne. There is a parent at the school where I work who BATHES in it. Each time I walk by, I am running to the bathroom.
FAVORITE: My cupcakes when they are done frosting
and my fiance’s shirt mmmm haven’t sene him in a month 
WORST SMELL: cat poop. dog poop. CILANTRO IS THE WORST SMELL EVA! barf. ok this is getting gross, but there are lots of nasty smell things
Happy SITS Day!!!
I love Tide! The original smell because back in the Philippines, Tide was the best laundry bar any medium income household can buy and it was always just a real treat to side that wavy bar, scored into four smaller bars. When you smell it or break it off, it’s just heavenly and you can almost smell how clean your laundry would be!
I buy the big box in Costco and each scoop still takes me back.
Thanks for a great jog down memory lane…
The one that comes to mind right now is Clearasil face wash. It has a very distinctive smell that carries me right back to all the fun times I had the summer between 8th grade and 9th grade. Or was it 7th and 8th? Regardless, it was summer and it was fun. And apparently I had bad skin.
When I was pregnant with my first, the smell of anything bbq made me sick; I like it now okay, but not as much as before the pregnancy. When I was younger, my sister threw up after drinking strawberry soda – I don’t really care for any of those artificially flavored sodas like grape, orange, strawberry, etc. but I do like the real fruits. On a better note, I grew up on the beach, so I love the smell of coconut-scented lotions, shampoos, etc. like Hawaiian Tropic. I just close my eyes and dream I’m home on the beach in Florida.
My nose and I get ourselves into real trouble!! It has almost ended my marriage…I think everything is spoiled and my husban doesn’t! I have to have only downy dryer sheets, and I don’t care if they are more expensive..I’ll give up buying food instead! I also smell shampoo before buying…it has to smell right or I won’t buy it!!
Smell On!
Great post…memories are often triggered for me by smells. There’s a shaving lotion that an old boy friend used to wear. I don’t know what it was, but occasionally I will pass a man wearing it….and it brings up….some very nice memories.
Suntan lotion does the same thing.
Smelling different items does bring back memories and migraines.
Hmmm….. Baby powder makes me think of all of the children I use to watch when I was in high school. I always put it on the little ones when I changed them.
I am the SAME way. Everything I smell brings back memories. Airfresheners remind of of the houses I’ve been to who where using that kind at the time. Food is a big one. Everything.
I love the smell of campfires. Takes me back to all those camping trips I took as a kid…and to this day, I still offer one marshmallow to the gods of the perfect embers over every campfire.
And Happy SITS Day!
Bleach! It makes me think of the woman who babysat me when I was little. Her house always smelled like bleech, especially the kitchen. I now do the same thing in my kitchen, cleaning counter with bleach. It just doesnt feel clean to me without it!
When I was a little girl, I used to feed my pet hamster celery, and to this day, the smell of celery reminds me of that hamster.
My mom wore Anais Anais when I was little… she even sprayed it in my “Pat the Bunny” book when the flowers page stopped smelling. My dad always called it “Anus Anus” as a joke… that’s prob why she switched to Beautiful! Hah!
I’m terrible at this commenting-about-something-specific stuff. It’s like calling someone and getting caught off guard by the answering machine and you just sit there like a deer caught in the headlights. I never know what to say.
So I will say this: Congrats on being the featured blogger on SITS today!
- Margaret
scents are powerful reminders of things. I agree
happy SITS day
I hate the smell of ranch dressing, but it takes me back to highschool.
Perfume reminds me of my first roommate, who wore too much.
Lilac reminds me of my MIL, who loves the scent and has it in all her soap.
Fun Post!
Oh I’m so with you on the sniff test. I can’t buy anything without prior approval. Fortunately my memories aren’t so… numerous, or I’d be in trouble
The smell of clean laundry reminds me of an apartment I had in Fayetteville, Georgia. The dryer ducts faced the breezeway, so I enjoyed the fresh scent of clean clothes whenever I approached my unit.
My husband says I have Bionic nose. Smells remind me of everything! I can totally relate.
I hate the smell of Aspin Colone for men! HATE. IT. When I was 16 a boy I liked thought it would be funny to pour it on me. I smelled for days. He was also my first kiss — which was HORRIBLE and I never wanted to kiss again. Two words: Windmill. Tongue. The thought still sends shivers down my spine!
I can’t really think of a smell that makes me sick right off the top of my head….
oh, yes I can. Broccolli. Have you ever smelled rotten broccolli?
Henious.
That is really neat that so many scents bring back such vivid memories! For some reason whenever I hear the “Andy Griffith Show” theme song, I get really nauseous and I have to turn it right away. I’m thinking that I suffered something awful during this show but have suppressed the memory
:):):) Now I’m trying to think of scents that might bring back memories for me!
Caress body wash reminds me of EFY both as a counselor and a participant. Churros used to remind me of Disneyland, but I’ve had them enough now that that’s not the case anymore. But plenty of tastes remind me of home. When I’m feeling especially homesick – being 1,600 miles away from family – I make food my mom likes… like pb&j with creamy pb and grape jelly, served with fritos or oatmeal.
I once spent 7 weeks with my Aunt and uncle in Slovenia. She made goulash. It had these weird bread balls thing in it that were guishy. I hate soggy bread. I had to eat it to be polite. I was ill the entire night. The next day we went to Vienna and would you believe what they were cooking at the Schonbrunne Palace that day (we happened to pass the kitchens in our tour of the grounds) …. goulash. The smell, or even just the thought of that goulash, makes me nauseous to this day.
What a great thought provoking post!
BBQ grills, the charcoal kind, always take me back to my childhood. Peanut Butter and Jelly always remind me of eating PB&J, smashed with a little dirt crunched in, at the Motor Cross track.
Hmm. I guess I’m just not a smell girl. I don’t have any specific smells that trigger anything, not even my Mom’s perfume. I wear it now and then hoping it will remind me of her, but it just doesn’t. Happy SITS day.