Writer's Block: Smells like teen spirit

[camrogers]

Are there any scents that invoke childhood memories?
 

Submitted By warpaintwoman

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Following a childhood adventure that saw me faceplant into a tree at 60kmph my sense of smell clocks in at around 25%.  At a guess.  It's hard to prove a negative and I don't remember what 100% was like, but I do know that people routinely comment on how good food smells and I wasn't aware there was food.  That said, some smells do get through easily.  Nag Champa incense puts me right back in my first year of university.  Specifically a two-level Queenslander in Townsville, all war-era kitchen, unpolished wooden floors, and a bedroom that was a partitioned off section of the front porch/sunroom.  Vertical glass blinds, clothes hung on a broomstick suspended from the ceiling.  A pair of opshop pants that I wore to death because they were loose enough to allow a full range of movement, whch I needed for two hours of warmup (yoga, tai chi, etc etc) in the Cow Shed from 6-8am every morning.  They wore through in the seat real quick and I wound up patching them with a large square of white-and-red polka dotted material. 

Half the class had bones in their hair, so it wasn't especially unusual.  It was a Bachelor of Theatre course for Chrissakes.  In Queensland.

Comments

[greylock]

Oranges and mandarins.
I had a childhood adventure on a farm which saw me faceplant myself into a still smoldering bonfire (presumably from the night before).

Naturally, I burnt myself.

I was carried back to the farmhouse, where the farmer's wife was cutting up citrus fruits.

To this day I still have queasiness associations whenever anyone peels an orange.

(The burn ointment I had to where afterwards, in my memory at least, looks exactly like that bright yellow curry powder that was so loved with curried sausages in the 1970s).