Smells and Bells

I enjoy thinking of the senses in whimsical ways. Our noses act as time machines transporting us back to our fondest memories. Magic happens inside of our eyes and brains popping images of anything we’d like to see into our minds. Our eardrums get tickled by invisible waves, causing us to dance. Butterflies flutter in our tummies at the touch of someone special’s lips to ours. Life is granted to us through tasting the flavors of the world.  I’ve contemplated the absurdity of our ability for sight specifically for a few years now. As I became older I naturally began having many revelations regarding how the world really works . One being the fact that the reason we see things is simply because our eyeballs capture the light reflected off of.. well literally everything. I learned about this process during my junior year of high school in AP Pysch, how our retinas capture the light reflected off of objects to create images in our brains, but never realized the actual hecking craz...

  Web Blog Sensory Interpretation Blog Prompt or 6? 5 senses... Welcome!  Here is the Web post  Assignment for our class, and general guidelines for what to include in your posts Sensory Interpretation Web Blog Posts  (6 posts on each of the senses, 5% each, plus one summarizing blog post the last week of class 10%, for a total of 40%).  Short reflection writing assignments to be posted on a blog set up specifically for this class  here . Students will "log" what they are learning about the relationship between the senses and "religious" experience throughout the term, and be able to comment on one another's questions and insights.  You should make at least 7 posts, @one every two weeks. Make sure you have one post each tagged with "taste", "smell", "hearing", "sight", "touch" or "6th sense."  To assure you will get credit for covering each of the six senses in your blog posts, edit them to make sure th...

Over the past month, I got really sick. It got to the point where they thought I had gotten the coronavirus and I spent a really “wonderful” day visiting 2 hospitals and being put in the COVID section. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t open my eyes to see because light would send piercing pain throughout my head. I got accustomed to being wrapped in a blanket when I got intense chills. I couldn’t smell because of my stuffed up nose. I was used to hearing my doctor on the phone asking the question, “have you been in contact with anyone who has been investigated for corona?”  My senses were overloaded and not working at the same time. I couldn’t enjoy what I used to enjoy. Have no fear, I did not have the corona. Instead, I got a really fun case of mono. How’d I get that in quarantine? I have no idea. Already being chronically ill, getting any other disease makes it feel ten times worse.   The view I had of my crocs in hospital room #2  All I wanted was to go back t...

I wasn't sure about how I wanted to finish the blog posts for this course, so I decided to spend some time with my senses and just share some observations. It is a sunny evening and so I figured it would be perfect to sit outside and reflect on what I have learned over the course of this semester. Smell : The smell of nature is difficult to describe, but there is definitely a smell. I don't know if I can put the smells of nature into words, but I feel like there is a slight smell in the air after a snow or rain storm or in the morning when there is still dew on the grass. Ackerman states that "nothing is more memorable than a smell" and I couldn't agree more (Ackerman, 5). When I thought about the smell of nature it made me immediately think about mornings walking to the bus stop as a kid after it had snowed and there was always a fresh smell in the air. Taste : I don't know if there is a specific taste that I notice right now as I sit on the porch, but ...

Touch is an interesting sense to think about. Out of all of the senses I feel that the sense of touch is one that I am both very aware of, but also not aware of at all. When thinking about the sense of touch I first think of my pets. I have a pet rabbit with such incredibly soft fur. While he is not a very fluffy animal, his fur still feels so silky and soft. Along with this I think of my puppy. There's something special about petting a young puppy, there is a distinct softness of a puppy's coat. Along with pets, the sensation of a loved one's touch like a hug is something so comforting. In times where My puppy, Charlie social distancing is the new social norm, I think we can all connect in some way to this recognition of how important touch actually is to us in our lives. ©  Nastya This awareness of the comforting sensation of touch is interesting when contrasted with how numb we can become to touch. Ackerman describes this in A Natural History of the Senses and...

“Musical tones mean something only in relation to one another, when they're teamed up” (205). When listening to one speak, what is heard is uniform, but the meaning of what is heard differs between individuals. This statement remains true when it applies to music. Everyone’s musical palettes differ, some may have a more diverse palette with a broader range of interests, while others invest more time into a more specific genre. There is a common saying known as “a picture paints a thousand words,” similarly, a song paints not only pictures but tells a story. Growing up learning piano taught me that music is a story in itself. The notes of each measure serve to tell a small part of the whole story.  To me, one piece that progresses to be one of the greatest stories is Ballade no. 1 in G minor, composed by Frederic Chopin. I have attached the link of this piece at the end of this post if anyone was interested in listening to it. The reason I wanted to focus on this piece specifical...

When it comes to cooking in the kitchen, there can often be gender roles. In the Rielly household, we usually all cook our own breakfast and lunch, but for supper, we usually always share the same meal. In my house, there are no gender roles. If you use a plate, put it in the dishwasher. If you cook, clean up the mess. Just because I am a woman does not mean I was born to be in the kitchen. Degrading stereotypes aside, you really don’t want me cooking anyways. I once burned a pan when making a grilled cheese because I left the stovetop on after I was done. However, I like to think I have redeemed myself with my years of baking. My dad does most of the cooking because he likes it. We joke that when my mom makes a meal for the family she has done her cooking for the month.   Chefs working on their creations © When reading Elizabeth Perez’s Religion in the Kitchen: Cooking, Talking, and the Making of Black Atlantic Traditions, I kept noticing how important it was to them that...

I typically begin writing these posts by first thinking about that particular sense and my favorite thing about it or something that sticks out to me, but I find this tricky with vision. I think it may be because sight is such a pervasive sense. Sight is so intertwined with our other senses. When one sees a beautiful flower they are draw in to take a sniff of its perfume. The presentation of a plate of food at one's favorite restaurant can add to the taste experience. When one sees a fluffy blanket in the isle of a store they will reach out to touch it, but not reach out and touch a simple plastic bottle. When one hears the crunch of leaves next to them they use their sight to see who or what is near them. Diane Ackerman describes sight in  A Natural History of the Senses as "the great monopolist of our senses" because "vision can... collect bushel basket of information as it goes" (Ackerman, 229-230). Dog smelling flowers © Sonny Annesley  The "bush...