Sense of Smell
There's a half-empty bottle of amber perfume that sits in a jumble of jewelry and trinkets on my dresser. I've had it for a couple of years now and don't use it very often; the scent is a bit stronger than I usually like. I only wore it on a daily basis for one month, while touring with Collegium during the summer of 2003. But I keep it around because the bottle is tall and narrow and travels well without much risk of breakage, and every now and then when I'm in too much of a hurry to unbox and unstopper my more-preferred scents, I'll throw on a spritz or two from the half-empty bottle. Despite - or maybe because of - this limited use, the perfume calls to mind the strongest scent memory I have ever experienced. As I walk through a cloud of fragrance toward my bedroom door, the carpet beneath my feet disappears and the room goes wide and dim, and for a breath I'm in the girls' dormitory of a hostel in Rome.
It doesn't remind me of Paris, where I'm sure I wore it as we trooped out the side door of Notre Dame to sing Jason's German music on the street.
It doesn't remind me of Salamanca, where I'm sure I wore it during the infamous kiss-counting contest between Alex and Jonah.
It doesn't even remind me of touring Rome-and-environs: the Vatican; the Spanish Steps; the hole-in-the-wall T.S. Eliot museum I stumbled upon, where a glass case surprised me with a letter from a long-ago Lowther.
A spray from this bottle reminds me of a single hostel room, with bunk beds and a window facing the pay phone from which I called my sister on her birthday. It reminds me of climbing up two stairs to reach the shower, of frittering away precious minutes online catching up on tour gossip, of watching two anonymous roommates bristle at Meg's suggestion that perhaps it was a bit too hot outside for their long-sleeved attire of choice. It reminds me of walking through an amber cloud in a poorly-lit room before going to dinner and placing bets on how Kemp and Abi would fare as traveling companions.
And for a moment I can inhale that summer, good and bad bound together in split-second recollection. Then the air clears, and fragrance and memory alike fade, and I am left looking blankly at a half-empty bottle of amber perfume.
posted by Emily @ 9:56 PM
7 Comments:
I'm feeling talkative today, so you'll all have to bear with another fusillade from the peanut gallery. I recently unstoppered my own preferred summer scent (I have them on seasonal rotation) and was immediately transported back to the sun-bleached public spaces of Spain circa June 2003. And by public spaces I also mean my brief pas de deux with one Miss C___, which was after all there for all to see like laundry hung from the narrow European windows. I miss her every time a whiff of that scent catches an errant breeze up to my nostril. I miss her every time I hang my laundry.
I, on the other hand, am transported back to Oaxaca, Mexico everytime I smell a Banana Republic perfume I used to own that smells vaguely of boy. I also am reminded of a podunk little town in southern Italy whenever I wear Michael Kors. And the fact that Matt once accused me of being a freak because of my heightened sense of smell. Liken me to Daredevil, two out of 5 scents are screwed, so now I can smell stuff. Lots of stuff. Also, wasn't there a two step shower in Siena too? Or was there just watching Abi slide around in the mud??
who's marginal graffiti?
If it's not Matt, I'll eat my shorts.
I totally second Meg's suggestion that Marginal Graffiti is, in fact, Matt Green. I think we should all call him Marge from now on, though, in recognition of his chosen alias.
Oh, and Siena totally had the coolest hostel ever, with twists and turns and countless staircases leading to floors that were just a couple of steps different in height. There were two showers near our room, as I recall, one at the end of our hall and one a few steps up and down a corridor that was unoccupied and therefore constantly dark. I was always vaguely creeped out in that hallway. Memorieeeees...
Siena also had that drum-playing tunic-wearing kid who was wearing sunglasses and looked like he thought he was too cool to be drumming. And, for that matter, wearing a tunic.
no shorts will need to be eaten on my account. i have been unmasked. and it's only fitting that that freak meg should have been the one to sniff me out (immediately?) - her nose is too acute, and my style, which she has had occasion to sample before, is too obtuse.
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