Senses

Probably the only people that don’t take the five senses for granted are those that have had the misfortune of loosing one. They are the ones that truly appreciate the remaining ones they have. If we stop and think about it, our senses are an extraordinary and amazing part of us. It is said that our senses are so powerful and important that they are often locked into our minds and paired with some type of memory or emotion.

The question has come up – can we trust our senses? The answer is “usually.” God gave us senses to protect us and to keep us safe. For example: when we hear a rattlesnake rattle we stop in our tracks and begin to step backwards cautiously. We wouldn’t go closer to the snake because we don’t want bitten by a venomous creature. But there are times when our senses can fool us. Vision is the most dominant sense in humans. This means when we see something, it can override another sense. For example, if Mom is carrying a platter of chicken to the table, you hear her say: “I’m going to sit and eat.” But what she actually said was, “I’m going to sit, I’m beat.” Your eyes “seeing” the chicken was more powerful than what your ears were hearing.

The sense of smell is the most sensitive of all the senses. According to research, people can remember smells with 65% accuracy after a year, while visual recall is only 50% after three months. I can still recall the smell of the soap my grandmother used 30 years ago. I cannot describe the smell to you, but when I run into it I have no doubt that close by there is a bar of the same kind of soap my grandmother used.  I loved going to her house and that smell today continues to fill me with a warm and pleasant feeling.

We probably don’t think about the sense of smell as much as we do the sense of seeing and hearing. But because smell is the sense most linked to emotional recollection I do not wish to loose that ability. I like that it triggers pleasant memories as in my grandmother’s soap.  One of my favorite smells is the smell of freshly cut alfalfa. It means summer, working with my dad, and enjoying ranch life in Nebraska. I also love the unique smell of horses, my Mom’s cinnamon rolls, timber being cut into firewood, and a summer rain after weeks of “rain wishing”. All of these hold good memories and pleasant experiences. I have a few smells I would just as soon forget too. The one that is engrained deeply into the area of the brain that keeps track of such things is the combo smell of rotten fish and spoiled corn. I learned this smell when our deep freeze quit. We didn’t realize it for days until the stench traveled upward from the basement to our living area on the main floor. At the time I was pregnant and was having difficulty even with the mild smell of frying hamburger.  I hope never to be subject to that smell again! If I do though, I have a couple things  in my favor – I won’t be pregnant and scent cells are renewed every 28 days so it might be that my “new nose” won’t smell it like the “old nose” did.

What are your favorite scents? The majority of people rate vanilla, some forms of orange scents, cinnamon, crayons, and cookies as their favorites. Except for Mom’s cinnamon rolls, I’m a bit of an odd duck. Do you join the majority of folks or are you an odd duck too?

Until next week – I’ll keep on writin’ if you keep on readin’.

 

 

 

 

 

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