NOTE: This is the Daily Writing Practice Prompt for September 6, 2008, which is from the Yahoo Group
Daily Writing Practice.
I read somewhere recently that the human nose can detect about 10,000 different scents. That is a lot of aromas. I have learned from experience that some scents have emotional attachments, either good or bad, to them. One fragrance that always brings back pleasant and unpleasant memories for me is a tobacco scent.
The aroma of Prince Albert always brings back memories of my grandfather. Grandpa rolled his own cigarettes from the time he was thirteen years old. I remember watching him roll a cigarette using Prince Albert Smoking Tobacco. I remember the aroma of the tobacco permeated his clothing and his bedroom. Even when he wore after shave lotion, the aroma of the tobacco he used was always there.
The tobacco he used to roll his cigarettes did not smell the same as the tobacco in the prerolled cigarettes he bought. The odors of the two were ccompletely different. Whenever I smell the aroma of smoking tobacco, I remember Grandpa. I remember watching him drive a car, make coffee, and I even remember sitting by his bed in the hospital as he lay dying. I remember the scent I always associated was still there to his last breath.
It is the last that is the unpleasant memory for me. I am not sure what he died of, I know what I suspect it was, but I cannot say for sure. I never looked at the death certificate to find out. I am not sure it matters at this point, what caused his death. What is important are the memories and the subtle fragrance that brings those memories back.
An author must look at all the fragrances in his or her life and the emotions that go with those fragrances. When a writer describes a scent in a story or a poem all the subtlies of an author's aroma memories must be included in the description to make the description real in the context of the story.
Labels: blog, blog entry, fragrance, writing practice, Writing prompts
