Tuesday, March 13, 2007

Aromas

Aromas of tenancy is a special thing. A home has a nice & warm smell. That’s what keeps them special. It could be anything, starting from the Phenyl in the floor, to the smell of food, flowers, burnt wick from the pooja room, oil paints in the kid’s room, room freshener, soap, powder, perfumes and sometimes even the discarded socks. : )) But that’s what makes a home.

Compare it to an unoccupied house or an office building. I remember a distinct smell of ledgers in my father’s office still. Or the lack of smell at some offices!!

An unoccupied building just smells of fresh paint and gives an eerie feeling to me. It keeps reminding that there are no people yet in that place.

Smell has a very deep association inside the mind. I have had some very bad experiences with incense sticks, because we once burnt dozens of them to keep away the smell of a friend who drowned to death. I used to hate it for ages. Or the antiseptic smell of clinics and hospitals remind me of my first job as a medical representative and the tyrannical Boss I had then. Or, I get a very warm feeling when I come across the smell of a burnt wick when I enter home, which somehow is a kind of a reassurance to me that God is around somewhere. Or the smell of the salty sea that reminds me of home if I am away somewhere. Or the soil’s smell just before it rains that is typically Madurai for me! Thank goodness I liked Chemistry that I withstood Ammonia and the professors.

I still get a sense of deja vu when I use a particular perfume I had while I was at college. Suddenly your mind is transported to distant places and time and all the happiness and miseries associated with that time. The air of Kodaikanal is filled with eucalyptus and as we climb up, before a few miles and invariably I get a smile in my face.

Even today, I go out to the terrace to get a few flowers of a variety of jasmine we grow and put them near the AC. I can still tell from miles away, the fragrance of ‘Lily of the Valley’ that my wife used when she was in college. : ))

When I was in Pattaya recently, whenever I crossed a firang I had this peculiar smell, which later I discovered as sunscreen lotion.

But nothing gives me greater pleasure than the fragrance of a baby mixed with the smells of baby powder, lotion and a uniqueness that is only babies’.

I douse myself with perfumes & aftershaves before I leave home and after I reach home as if I am man possessed with it. For me, it’s all about how it plays in my mind. And I bet I can even be hypotinised with the right fragrances. Pretty dangerous!!

1 comment:

sidwho? said...

I would also hold that smell of freshly purchased book !

And ofcourse.. The eternally arousing smell of crisp currency notes...:-))The Best That Is!!