1) I grew up on a small farm in New Jersey in the 1950's and 60's — a part of the country that has long since become anonymous suburbia. Our one cow, whose name was Cow Beauty, had a nice little shed adjacent to the pasture, and in that shed was a hay loft. Now of course the interior of that shed had a very particular smell -- hay, wood, cow, cow shit, etc. But, one day Cow Beauty gave birth to a calf. (How our one cow became with child, so to speak, was not a question that occupied seven-year-old me.) And when that calf was weaned, we nursed it with formula in a bottle, just like one you would use to nurse a baby baby. And that formula, which was a mixture of water and powder that came in a burlap sack, had a particular smell. So one of my lost 'madeleine' smells is just that: the interior of Cow Beauty's barn during the time that the nursing calf was still there: some combination of the odors of cows, hay, wood, burlap, cow shit, and baby cow formula.
Many years after the farm was no more, I found myself living in a small village in Senegal. There were no cattle there anymore, but there were sheep and goats. And there was also, courtesy of the UN's UNICEF program, corn-soya-milk to help supplement the diet of infants in children. It came in burlap sacks. The smell of these things combined was tantalizingly close to the smell of that cowshed. But it wasn't the same. I wonder if that smell exists anywhere on earth in 2025. 2. *The Smell of Other People's Houses,* a novel by Bonnie-Sue Hitchcock https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19370304-the-smell-of-other-people-s-houses I haven't read this novel, but I do know the author — or used to, anyway. In 2006 - 7 I spent a lot of time in Colorado Springs, helping my brother & sister in law through a difficult time. Bonnie-Sue was a college friend of my sister in law; she used to help out as well. She & I used to play 1-on-1 basketball. I was taller and an OK shooter, she was quicker and a much better shooter. As a high school student Bonnie-Sue had been a star athlete. She had some very funny stories to tell about playing against Sarah Palin, who later became Governor of Alaska & the vice presidential nominee on the Republican ticket headed by John McCain. But we're very far afield from stories of memorable smells, so I'll stop here. jrs On Fri, Apr 18, 2025 at 9:26 PM Udhay Shankar N via Silklist < [email protected]> wrote: > On Fri, Apr 18, 2025 at 7:32 PM Thaths via Silklist < > [email protected]> wrote: > > Smells, more than taste (well, what is taste, but just a weaker way of >> smelling?), play the role of bringing memories of madelines past for me. >> >> What are some scents from the past that you would pay good money to >> experience again? >> >> https://www.ft.com/content/53a3a13b-fe98-4670-9163-be659ccbf4f2 >> > > Here's a personal anecdote of this: > > In the early 80s, my father was gifted a bottle of Jules > <https://www.fragrantica.com/perfume/Dior/Jules-1243.html> cologne. In > those pre-liberalization times, it was a rare thing that was used > sparingly, and was forever associated in my mind with my father wearing it > on big occasions like weddings or suchlike. That bottle lasted decades, to > give you an idea. > > It was discontinued sometime after, never lost > <https://www.yesterdaysperfume.com/yesterdays_perfume/2014/06/jules-by-christian-dior-1980.html> > its fan following among perfume aficionados. Perhaps as a sop to this > group, it was re-launched in the 2000s sometime, but only as a limited > edition, available only at the flagship Dior store in Paris. Through a > member of this list, I enlisted the help of a mutual friend who was > traveling to Paris on work to pick up a bottle for me. Apparently, the very > fact that he knew to ask for Jules gave him some cred with the sales people > there. :) > > This bottle took an incredibly roundabout route to reach me, but reach me > it did, eventually. The smell was objectively different from the original > formulation, but close enough to give me that hit of instant nostalgia - > which I indulge in from time to time. > > Udhay > > PS: I was sharing this story recently with another member of this list, > also called Jules. :) > -- > Silklist mailing list > [email protected] > https://mailman.panix.com/listinfo.cgi/silklist >
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