It Smells Like Home

By -
You know when you get the sort of strange feeling when you step into a friends house for the first time. You don't know where anything is, you're not quite sure how to go about doing anything, and the entire house smells weird. Not necessarily a bad smell. although that can happen, but it's as if you're surrounded by something your body has to get used to. It can take some time.
Eventually, as you become better friends and you visit their house more and more often; you'll start the notice the smell less and less. It will become second nature for you to be in this house. You may not even remember that it used to smell so different to you, now you don't notice any difference from anywhere else in your life. Why is that?

I know when people come to my house for the first time I have asked what they smell that's different than what they're used to. They mention that they can tell I have a dog. Does it smell bad like a dog? No, simply that there is an animal in the house. (Although I do live on a farm which likely adds to the animal tones in the air as well)
Friends have also mentioned that they smell cookies and/or whatever baked goods when they're in my house. My Mom and I love to bake so this is to be expected. I like that what people can smell in our house has a lot to do with who we are as a family. 
I don't notice these smells anymore as it is my house and they are perfectly natural for my brain to register. So why would my brain bother to alert me of a smell I am completely surrounded by at most times? We would go crazy if we were constantly bombarded with every smell we ever came in contact with. Our brains adapt to what smells are part of our usual environment and adapt our processing of these smells to be basically under the radar. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Amidst the Pandemic

By -
Image
I think having the opportunity to take Smells and Bells and then experiencing a worldwide pandemic came with good timing. Oftentimes, we’re so rushed to get from one one place to another that we miss out on what happens around us. We’re so accustomed to the lifestyle of being busy that it has become the norm for many of us. However, the pandemic has forced us to slow down. We’re now appreciating everything that we had previously taken for granted and noticing things in our surroundings that we have never noticed before.  Take this quarantining/social distancing as an opportunity to be more aware of what you experience through the senses. I don’t think my senses have necessarily heightened over the past 5 weeks, but I am actively making the choice to pay more attention to what I see, hear, touch, taste, and smell. I like going on nature/mindfulness walks and basking in the sunshine out in my backyard. This morning, I could hear a faint noise from the wind, hear the birds chirpin...
Read more

Food in the Afterlife

By -
Image
In Religion in the Kitchen: Cooking, Talking, and the Making of Black Atlantic Traditions , Perez talks of Ashabi and her grandchildren providing food offerings to their ancestors. This immediately reminded me of the practice of food sacrifice in early China. I've taken Chinese language classes for about 7 years now and in one of the lessons, we learned about food as well as the history of food in Chinese culture. Ashabi and her grandchildren would give food offerings to their ancestors every day. This included nine beverages (coffee, liquor, and water mixed with sugar and molasses) and nine square pieces of coconut topped with red palm oil and guinea pepper. The offerings would also include whatever food was dropped on the ground. In their house, food dropping on the floor signified more than it would in common American households. It signified that the ancestors wanted that food and had willingly made it fall to the floor. They also used dishware that had been chipped which was...
Read more