sense and scents

people presume my job involves mostly tasting. indeed whenever i'm meeting with a maker or rep, or go to an event, we call it *tasting*. the human palate is capable of discerning a few hundred distinct flavors. but the nose is where it's at. the nose can process thousands of aromas. those savants who become perfumiers can distinguish perhaps as many as 10,000 different smells. my colleagues and i can parse cork-dork all day about whether a particular chassagne-montrachet recalls more of a spring or summer meadow...

my brain has a very large file of how people and rooms and oceans and all manner of things in my life smelled. my grandparents (well, not that one grandmother because she never allowed us close enough physical contact like hugging or anything grannies are supposed to do), my mother's car, my pets, the streets in sienna vs. the streets in heidelberg. different lovers before, during and after sex. countless and very retrievable recollections for me.

there's a nifty group of nerds doing research on taste and smells. they recently conducted a study on how people of each gender and different sexual orientations responded to the body odor of others. (which hapless intern got stuck with the task of collecting swab samples of armpit sweat? ack.) heterosexual men were asked to sniff samples and then rank them most pleasant down to most unpleasant. obviously they weren't told what was from whom. predictably their top choice was from heterosexual women, and their last was that from homosexual men. the results corresponded accordingly with straight women, homosexuals and lesbians.

lab mice can smell cancer in other mice. wild animals scent mark territory and scientists believe the next lion pissing on that same tree can tell how old, how healthy, his last meal and all sorts of things about his urinary predecessor. we see dogs sniffing each other's hind ends and have no problem accepting this is how they collect and process all sorts of vital doggie info. ever seen rover go from his nose in a strange dog's butt to snapping and growling at him in a flash?

before we got all bogged down with the complications of language and personal autonomy, did oog the caveman simply drag off the nearest chick who smelled yummy to him? alas, now we humans with our big brains and social codes of acceptable behavior can't walk up to a stranger and sniff their nether regions now can we? lol, imagine the snub if one literally turned up one's nose? oh, i'll crack myself up all day with that image!

a scientist would never be so loosey-goosey, but i'll take the leap and say our brains are wired to prefer the scent of a certain someone over another someone, and that's part of the whole chemical reaction of lust. a particular someone often inhaled his hands after having his way with me. i can recall many times lying in a man's arms (not all of them mind you--only a few were allowed coital repose) and breathing him in. to me his scent was so bonding and soothing. it was calming to me because it was so simple and primal.

and right now, it's the simpler things in which i find the most comfort. even in memory.