Scent memories

hiccups · Future Queen in Zion

Scent memories

MegaMatt · Veteran Member

I definately have smells that I associate with people. In highschool, I would associate smells with girls I was crushing on. I remember one girl that smelled like candy some how...

MegaMatt · Veteran Member

Ooh! Also the distinct smell of rain in the desert! The creasote bush has the exact smell. Glumrk also really appreciates the smell. When I took her home to meet the whole fam last Thanksgiving, we went on a fourwheeler ride through the desert and while we were stopped...uh..to talk about,...wholesome things, I took a little bit of creasote and put it in my flannel shirt pocket. When we returned back from the trip, I put all my laundry, including flannel in the wash and dry. Then for like the next four or five months, the pocket of that shirt smelled like rain and it reminded me of that great time I had with Glumrk and the growth our relationship had during that trip.

The best part though was walking around the institute of religion asking people to smell my pocket!

Jen · Senior Bucketkeeper

No. I don't smell so good. The only time I smell very good is when I'm pregnant. :D

coolcucumbers · Senior Member

I can totally relate. I get good memories and bad memories that flood back by just catching a wiff of something. And all the feelings associated with the memory as well. Some of the bad ones really put me in a funk for a day or so. but the good ones....gotta love the good times!

beefche · Profuse Pontificator

The smell of mothballs, diesel fuel, and burning trash (not combined) reminds me of my mission.

Roper · Senior Bucketkeeper

I heard somewhere that there's been a lot of research done on smell and memory, and that some of the conclusions are that we remember smells better than other sensory input and that smell triggers associated memories better than the other senses.

Dairy farms have a distinct smell--hay in the summer, silage in the winter, and manure all year round. The smell reminds me of home and growing up in SE Idaho. I don't find it unpleasant at all.

I also like the smell of outdoor cigarette smoke when it's blown briefly past by a breeze. it reminds me of sitting in the stands with my dad and watching the rodeo at the county fair each year.

I also like the smell of JP-8 exhaust from the engines of a C-130, because it meant we were taxiing to our own ramp coming back from deployment, and I would see my family again within the hour.

rayb · Hot Air Balloon

The old cities in Italy have a distinct smell... occasionally I catch a similar whiff and I'm on my mission again...

Dyany · Senior Member

Technically, there are 2 physiological reasons why smell is strongly associated with memory. First, there is no cortex to process scents before they go directly into the thinking part of the brain, and second, the thinking part of the brain they go to is also associated with memories. So the unfiltered sensory perception of scent is directly associated with memory more than any other sense is even capable of.
mode off>

Yeah, that happens to me all the time. In fact, I've had dreams with scents in them that were so powerful that when I smelled the scent again, the dream came back in full force. Scents bring back more lucid memories than anything else for me. And luckily, they are mostly good memories -- have no idea why that is. Don't know why HF would wire the brain that way, either.

fear of shiz · Profuse Pontificator

Interesting article on this phenomenon here: here

Quote:

"The sense of smell is probably the very first sense to evolve in a living creature. Back in the early days of evolution when we began as single-celled creatures, our sense of "smell" told us what was safe to eat. All living creatures have a sense to detect chemicals in their immediate environment.

In the more complicated animals, the sense of smell is used for other aspects of behaviour such as finding a mate, synchronising menstrual cycles, and communicating with the other animals in your group. Women can tell (by the smell of swabs taken from the armpit) who has been watching happy or sad movies (men are not so good at this). A breast-feeding baby can differentiate the smell of his or her mother, from any other nursing mother. Dogs and horses can smell fear in humans."

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

I used to have a boyfriend who wore Obsession. We broke up sort of and I was working at the Mullboon's Restaurant that used to be across from Trolley Square. I was seating a couple and as I turned to leave, I caught the whiff of Obsession. Stopped me in my tracks.

I also like the smell of gasoline at the gas station, anything to do with horses and the smell of chlorine still makes me nervous, like I'm 5 yrs. old and going to swim lessons.

I believe horses can smell fear in humans. It doesn't make for such a good ride.

arbilad · Head Chef

So you don't spray your horses with Obsession before going for a ride?

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

That's funny. No, really.

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

I smell a rat.

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

Did you know that when you smell a skunk it's totally good luck?

(My mom and I made that up... but we believe it, so it totally works.)

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

After Church tomorrow, we'll be smellin' roast!

Poncho29 · Senior Bucketkeeper

Cocobeem wrote:

Did you know that when you smell a skunk it's totally good luck?

Not in our neck of the woods.

glumirk · Senior Member

I sometimes catch whiffs that send me back to distant memories of my childhood, like Grandma's house, cleaning my room on a summer evening, digging a ball out of the neighbors' bushes.

I had a roommate who couldn't stand the smell of popcorn because of a memory (a year long memory).

Poncho29 · Senior Bucketkeeper

The only time I remember smelling a smell that really meant something to me was right after my mom died. My sisters and I were going through her closet and getting rid of stuff or else dispersing it and I remember holding some of her clothing, smelling them and I said, "They even smell like her." As if she were close by or she had just been there or something.
I wanted to hang on to that smell as long as I could. That was almost 13 years ago, but I can still remember that feeling and I can stil sort of remember that smell. It still kind of gets to me.

Cat Herder · Understander of unimportant things

Smell has some memory attached to it, but for me music / attached emotion seems to have a more profound impact on memory assignment / remembrance in my brain though.

Oh yeah, coco, if you want to smell a lot of good luck, you're welcome to come visit us and take a whiff outside in the late evening or early morning after the skunks have been out playing with the ninja deer and mutant squirrels... We kid you not that one skunk can cause a stink that will cover at least a square mile radius around here, and if it shares its luck with something that is close to your home, it can literally cause tears to come to your eyes as you sense that smell of burning tires that just doesn't go away...

PollyAnna · Senior Bucketkeeper

Poncho29 wrote:
As if she were close by or she had just been there or something. I wanted to hang on to that smell as long as I could.

I had a similar experience... It was ethereal...

zealia · Profuse Pontificator

Scents can trigger a memory for me. I am sorry that your memory seems to be a bad one, Hiccups. I think that scents are generally associated with good memories for me. In some ways, I have a keen sense of smell. I have had smelled a cucumber being cut two rooms away. :)

Janey · Senior Member

My mission smelled very different than the U.S. I can't describe what they are, but when I get a whiff of certain odors, I'm right back in Kiev.

Euphrasie · Senior Bucketkeeper

I can always tell who's been holding my baby because she always smells like whoever it was when I get her back.

nitasmile · Senior Member

~noxious odors I can't stand: somehow the smell of bananas make me gag, I like bananas but need be in right mood. Sometimes even thinking about bananas make me gag. Still I do l ike to eat them- just prefer to mix them w/yogurt, peanut butter or in some food (ie banana bread)

~ Nitro bridge in Nitro, WVA- terribly smelly bridge that goes over a chemical plant. I can still recall the smell. People would hold their nose as they drove over that bridge. Luckily I haven't found a chemical that is similar.

~hot ginerale and cinnamin redhots- reminds me of what my mom would make when we were sick

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

Janey wrote:

My mission smelled very different than the U.S. I can't describe what they are, but when I get a whiff of certain odors, I'm right back in Kiev.

Hold the phone!! You went on a mission to Kiev??? Skol pafiskin!! Were you anywhere near Chechersk?? That's like right close by... a little southish-westish. My grandpa's from there! Are you going back anytime soon?

Cat Herder · Understander of unimportant things

Coco, this one is for you and your smell of good luck memory...

Michigan Cop Takes Aim to Save Skunk With Head Stuck in Salad-Dressing Jar

salesortonscom · Wise and Revered Master

I have noticed that some scents definitely trigger memories. When I go to my kids school there are certain places like the cafeteria or the library that smell exactly the same and take me back to when I was a student there. Sometimes the wind blows just right and gives the area a smell similar to the coast which triggers memories. Smell seems to be so much more powerful than sight for triggering these. I wonder why?

hiccups · Future Queen in Zion

Yeah, scent is powerful for triggering those memories. The bad memory that was triggered that led to my starting this thread was so strong and vivid that it basically caused a fight or flight response in me.

Here's another example. My mom always wore Maybeline lipstick. I didn't realize that was the brand until I bought some once and put it on and it smelled like my mom. It was a bit disconcerting, so I opted to not wear it anymore. (I love my mom, I just don't want to be her.)

Cat Herder · Understander of unimportant things

There is the smell of old wood that brings back the sense of being in old musuem type buildings... the smell of certain types of mixtures of soil, moisture, and plants that remind me of being at my grandparents in Alabama... the smell of lemon pledge and endust that reminds me of cleaning days at my parents home...

Just this morning on the way back from dropping beserker warrior son off at kindergarten, I smelled something that had seperate components that ended up triggering all three of those smell recognitions / memories.

Pt314 · Senior Member

The smell of rubbing alchohol makes me sick, because it reminds me of medical clinics/hospitals, which reminds me of getting shots, or my blood drawn, which sometimes makes me and go into minor shock all over again.

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

The smell of Vick's makes me yell, "NO!" and hide under the coffee table, violently sucking my thumb.

HA! Not anymore!! I am STRONGER than my scent memories! Yes, I am! I will take that Vick's and hold it under my nose and chant, "I am bigger than you. You cannot control me..."

Great, cat - now you've ruined salad dressing for me for at least a week. grr!

PollyAnna · Senior Bucketkeeper

smell is a power trigger, for some people... for others not... However the reality of that fact is one of the reasons aroma-therapy works for people with strong scent identifications...