The Nose Knows…

Something has been brewing in my nervous system, and I didn’t recognize it until this morning when I let Emmet outside.

I’ve been juggling a lot lately, fair to say. Between a heavier workload than usual, and spending more time in Seattle, some of that time being with three wonderful but very teenage girls, some travel, and extreme (for Seattle) heat, I would call recent months “challenging” but not unreasonable. Most of it has been fun and not worth the agitation and stress that has built up lately.

This morning I opened the sliding door and was hit with the most wonderful smell of 5:30am in the Pacific Northwest on a day that promises to be hot. As I inhaled, I could read everything it was telling me. Then I recalled feeling this way last year. And the year before. This would have been about the time Paul came home for hospice in 2018. Morning-dampened dry green summer air, open windows, fans, surf music, ripening tomatoes, homemade ice cream.

These are happy and wonderful things, but the sadness and stress from that time is permanently woven into my fibers and becomes activated without me consciously knowing it. I felt a dose of it two weeks ago, when Jay and I went down to Lake Tahoe for some work in my CA office and the Trans-Tahoe swim relay. Such a distinctive smell, eliciting a swirl of happy nostalgia, sadness, and new memories.

I realize these memories will evolve, but I also don’t want to see them go. This month, I plan to savor my time at home. Morning-dampened dry green summer air, open windows, fans, surf music, ripening tomatoes, homemade ice cream. I just might share some of that time with Jay and his three wonderful girls.