On Olfactory High Alert

As I walked into Deborah’s house yesterday afternoon, I detected a very different smell. My nose seems like it is on high alert for new scents. It wasn’t food. Had there been a problem, an accident, or what? Should I ask?

Just then Jen, the petite Chinese woman who lives with Deborah, walked in with a can of paste floor wax. She and Deborah’s husband had decided to wax the hardwood floors. So that was it. It actually started to smell good once I knew it was legitimate.

This experience and my recent saga with the garlic concentrate made me realize how defining is that first smell that greets you when you open the door. You can often know that there is smoker in the house, that a garlicky dish was on the previous night’s dinner menu, or even that something spilled in the oven.

For a long time we have feared that visitors to our house are greeted by the smell of the occasional pet vomit, pee, or poop that have graced our floors. Perhaps we have just become used to these unpleasant smells.

Of course pet smells have been totally overshadowed by the heavy garlic smell. Every day as I open the side door to come home, I try to convince myself that the odor is fading.

Then there’s the recent attempt to cover up the garlic with room freshener. The other day I was greeted by the heavy perfume of a plug-in that my husband had bought. It was unbelievably gross. So I unplugged it, put it in a plastic bag, and hung it outside on our fence immediately.

Let’s look at this in a positive way. What are the smells we might like to encounter upon entering someone’s house?

– Chocolate chip cookies baking.
– Lemon-scented Pledge furniture polish.
– Pleasantly scented laundry detergent.
– Some wonderful wood burning in the fireplace.
– Nothing at all.

Personally I am all for nothing at all!

For someone whose nose seemed to be off-duty for a long while, my sense of smell now has returned completely. I’ve never been more aware of the role that smell plays as a welcome mat!