The Nose Knows

I was standing in the kitchen doing the routine chores of the morning when a familiar scent wafted into the room from the recently opened bathroom door. As my memory registered the humid mix of ivory soap and right guard, a wave of nostalgia swept over me and I found myself being transported back home. I indulged the memory with a short trip to the bathroom to sit and breath deeply and remember all of the times I had smelled it before, hundreds of mornings as a little girl, teen, and young adult. My dad is visiting this week and has brought with him the shower staples that have been his stand by for as long as I can remember.
Why is it that certain smells can bring back such strong memories?
For my dad, it is the above mentioned toiletries and a certain pink mint candy. Homemade bread, chocolate chip cookies, and perm solution (not all at once of course) will conjure up an image of my mom. My grandpa smells like orange soap and petroleum products, from years of working in a service station fixing cars, pumping gas, and running an oil lube. I am reminded of my grandma when I smell hamburger stew or late-night buttered toast (the post-bedtime indulgence we always looked forward to when sleeping at her house). Remembering my late grandfather always brings back thoughts of black coffee with cream and an image of the two swirling together in his mug after dinner when he let me stir. There is a smell to my grandma's house that I can instantly recognize when I walk in the door with the familiar creak- a mix of heating oil, old furniture, lilacs, and boiled potatoes with white gravy. The smell of sawdust always makes me smile as I think back to the nights when we were engaged and first married and I met Mike outside of my apartment as he returned from work and had to dust the sawdust off his clothes and hair before I could kiss him goodnight.
Funny how you never forget some things and those old scents are always comforting. I always look forward to sneaking a nap in my parents' bed when I go home to visit. Not only is it the most comfortable bed in a house of sofa sleepers and bunk beds, but there is something familiar and soothing about the scent of the pillows that my mom and dad slept on the night before. I can nod with an understanding heart when Lenna comes to my room to steal my pillow on the nights she is having a particularly hard time sleeping, when Andrew is overtaken by the urge to smell my hair, or the women at church feel compelled to sniff my baby's head.
I wish there was a way to bottle up those old familiar smells and tuck them away for later when you want to remember. The way fresh notebooks and new crayons remind me of elementary school or the anticipation that comes with the scent of book binding glue and fresh ink. Or the way sagebrush, pine, hay, and woodsmoke reminds me of the town where I grew up. The smell of a worn basketball and a polished gym floor coupled with the squeak of gym shoes gives me the urge to shoot baskets. Funnel cakes, cotton candy, corn dogs, and taffy will transport me back to summers at the county fair.
I wonder what my children will think of when they remember their childhood years from now?