Santa Ana Winds

This is one of those scents you have to catch early in the morning, before all the moisture’s been leached out of the air and you can’t smell anything at all. First is the last vestiges of the cool morning air that’s rapidly warming up, followed by the rarely encountered smell of mature leaves blowing against each other–there’s eucalyptus, sure, but also additional green smells from the olive, citrus and avocado trees in the back yard–that aren’t as pungent or moist as freshly mown grass, but are still identifiably vegetal. The wind-chimes and rustling leaves add to the excitement that the Santa Ana’s always seem to bring, and there’s probably already a spiky-stemmed palm frond or two on the front lawn that needs to be carefully carted to the side of the house. Later in the day the smoke from the inevitable wildfires reminds everyone of one of the downsides of living in the Golden State.

Soul food? Cortina’s.

The smell shouldn’t work but it totally does. The hodgepodge mix of luncheon meats, hard and soft cheeses, and freshly baked Italian bread and cookies only means two things to me: Cortina’s, and I’m home. It’s our family’s version of soul food and I make at least one trip every time I’m back. My face is fixed in a wide grin as I stroll through the aisles, and I probably look like a lunatic to be so ecstatic about Italianate packaged goods, imported though they may be, but I am unashamed. I love this place, and I’ll probably take back at least a pound each of Jordan almonds and imported Parmesan when I leave.

Late Night Freeway – Orange County

Foggy moisture combined with the dust, oil, and exhaust of the day’s traffic, the oleander doing its damnedest to take in all of the toxins itself. In the spring, if it was warm enough, there used to be a breath of orange orchards in bloom down by Irvine, and I’d almost want to slow down to prolong the experience. Nowadays, I feel lucky if I can catch some eucalyptus as I speed home through the cool, orange-lighted air.

Coat Closet – Mom’s house

The dense but faded smell of her 50-year-old cashmere coat combines with dust and must from dried-out umbrellas and various 70’s era Pop Warner football windbreakers. The chemical cool emissions of the box full of super-8 films, an unmistakable manufactured sheen-smell of the projection screen, and the muted metallic scent of the projector soon take over. I always take a whiff whenever I’m home, and when I open the door I am transported to another room where the sounds of the film’s clunktunck-shshsh-tk-tk-tk-tk loading are followed by watery images of children who now have families of their own.

Van’s Tennis Shoes

Rubber and new cloth and dyed canvas; oily creosote from the railroad ties behind the factory store. I got a brand new pair of red Van’s tennis shoes every fall, to wear with my tights and dresses and later, my brothers’ hand-me-down play clothes. At kindergarden recess, I would untie the laces so that I could watch them flutter toward me and away as I went back and forth on the swings. I always needed help getting them retied, but no amount of scolding could prevent me from doing it again. No other new shoes smell quite the same as Van’s–I’m glad to see that they’re still around.

Edited to add: Since I’d planned a trip home, I looked up the address of the old factory. I drove by there yesterday, and it’s no longer Van Doren Rubber Company, but you can see the bricked in space where we used to enter the store.

Pencil Shavings

The enthusiastic sharpness of wood shavings and the industrial classroom smell of lead brought into existence by the metal grinding gears of my dad’s pencil sharpener. When he worked late at night, I could hear its dull growling rhythm through the shared wall of my bedroom and his den.

Sharpening a pencil yesterday, I was struck by the same frisson of excitement which used to come with the privilege (or sneakiness) of getting to empty a nearly filled container of grey dusted wood crumbs into my grade-school classroom’s rubbish can, which was lined with a brown plastic bag. A small handful of us really dug the activity, and there was always a faint letdown whenever we heard someone else open the canister at the back of the room.

Denipaire – Autumn morning

The oily, acrid smell of workhorse smoke from wood that’s being used to heat the homes in the village. Mixed in are the scent of rain on cow fields and tree leaves, and the exhaust of the bus that comes to pick us up for school. The 15 mile ride takes us through similar fields and villages, and, somewhere in the middle, a small but dense forest in which ET would’ve felt completely at home.