Writer's Block: Smells like teen spirit
Oct. 26th, 2010 09:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Recognizing the powerful link between scent and memory, for my 8th grade science fair project I ran memory tests using distinctive scents (ginger and lemon essential oils)
I ran the experiment in my basement using a set of antique Victorian school desks as my workstation. I had several sets of 10 random objects (toy car, lego, pencil, etc) each glued to shoebox lid "trays." In the control test, subjects studied a tray for (30 seconds? one minute? I forget), took a break for a set amount of time, and then were asked to record as many objects as they could remember. In the variable test, subjects studied the tray while smelling a cotton ball soaked in one of the two scents, took the same break (with no scent), and then were able to smell the scent again while
The experiment didn't prove anything at the time because I was only testing short-term memory, and the only statistically significant data I collected was proving proactive interference because everyone remembered the first set better than the second set regardless of which was scented. (Luckily I had sense enough to expect this, which is why I rotated between scents first and scents second).
However, I did prove something, because now every time I smell ginger I immediately think of those desks in our basement, cotton, and cardboard trays.
(I even wonder if this accounts for why I don't like ginger that much; I was always stressed out during science fair, and I would have been running the experiment in my cold basement during the worst time of the year.
I have an impeccable memory, made even more so by my strong sense of smell (I've started to wonder if I don't pick up on scents more subtle than other people-- which wouldn't surprise me since I often suspect I'm an HSP), so this will take a while.
Baby Magic baby lotion makes me think of, well, being a baby. So does Baby Orajel (which I still sometimes use when I have a sore in my mouth and want to keep from messing with it with my tongue) and Johnson and Johnsonss No Tears baby shampoo. What do I remember from being a baby? The lotion makes me think of being on my changing table and the plastic-encased foam I would have lied on, surrounded by white painted wood bars. I also remember watching Tory as a baby on that same table, picking up and observing things like the red suspenders we owned but I never remember any of us wearing and the tiny white baby booties Mom sometimes would put her in and sing "Shake Your Booty" as she kicked. The Orajel reminds me of teething on the Orajel tube itself and the Orajel leaking through. (Quite an effective teething biscuit, lol). The shampoo makes me think of the uncomfortable way Mom used to rinse the shampoo out of my hair when she bathed me, either dumping cup after cup of water over my head and smearing my hair back with her hands, or, when I got older, forcing my head under the faucet, which I frequently bumped with the back of my head when I came back up again. (So much for "no more tears" /-:). More pleasantly, it reminds me of Mom pulling me into a warm brown bath towel and rubbing my hair as I got out of the bath, singing this song which I'm pretty sure she made up:
I'll bundle a baby, a beautiful baby;
I'll bundle up my baby that I adore.
When she is drying, she is not crying,
So I'll bundle up my baby forevermore.
As you can see, my mom sang a lot. (My mom's songs deserve their own post, frankly. Someone hold me to that; I'll post about it at some point).
Actually, just about all the shampoos I use associate themselves with the times in which I used them, since one tends to smell like their shampoo. I actually didn't stop using No More Tears until I was really old (just like I didn't stop using easy-squeeze bottles of saccharine sweet-flavored toothpaste until I actually complained to my mom that "I want some grown-up spicy toothpaste") because it was just easier for me Mom to buy us all baby products while there was still a baby in the house. (Neil is 7.5 years younger than me). But I remember the Suave Daily Clarifying shampoo I used (without conditioner-- holy Jesus no wonder my hair was such a puffball back then!) in middle school, the anti-chlorine damage shampoo I used during swim team in high school, the Vive Pro Smooth and Frizz-Ease I used during the rest of high school, and I certainly remember the Sunsilk Hydra TLC shampoos and conditioners I used in college since I still love them even now (and am conserving the one bottle I have very dearly, since I have alternatives here). I'm sure I'll associate Herbal Essences (Japan line) Mermaid Moisture with Japan once I leave, if I have the opportunity to smell it again
I also associate body products, the scent of which, like shampoo, linger constantly in order to form distinct memories of an entire time. I had a (rather heinous, looking back) bottle of glittery blue Art Stuff Berry Go Round lotion* from Bath and Body Works in 6th grade (lotion AND glitter in one, what more could you want?) that makes me think of winter that year, when I wore it most. I particularly think of New Year's Eve, which was unique against all other NYEs I've experienced in that we weren't abroad nor at the lake; we went to a family friend's NYE party where they cooked live lobsters. I remember playing with the lobsters on the floor, racing them . . . And then they threw them in the pot, and I was horrified. And then Mom had me try a piece of cooked lobster and I chewed on it for about 45 minutes before I finally spit it out. Poor tough traumatized lobsters )-:
I also remember body sprays and perfumes, like the cloying alcoholic peach body spray I kept in my gym locker in middle school. (It was such a bad scent, even more so on me, and yet I was possessive of it and would only use little spurts and got pissed when girls asked to borrow it and did that whole spray-a-massive-cloud-and-then-walk-through-it thing). Bath and Body Works Japanese Cherry Blossom body spray and lotion became my signature scent since I received a bottle after freshman year of college-- but while at times I think of college, since I still use this scent the association is not as strong. However, Robert associates this scent (and that of the Sunsilk Hydra TLC shampoo) with me, so I mailed him a sample, and he mailed me some of his cologne. It probably sounds creepy, but we both acknowledge
Food, of course, has some intense associations. Like most Americans, I associate turkey, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin pie (or pumpkin spice) with Thanksgiving. Christmas is peppermint and pine needles. (Forget chestnuts roasting on an open fire; I never tried a roasted chestnut until I was 16 or so). Grilled meat (and vegetables like zucchini, onions, green pepper, and those ridiculous but oh-so-delicious-in-shish-kabob canned whole potatoes) reminds me of summers at the lake with Dad cooking out. Onions sauteed in butter remind me of weekend mornings when Dad would make his special hash or Bauernfruhstuck. White wine used in cooking makes me think of Sunday dinners when the meal was a little more special and time-consuming and we sometimes ate in the dining room. It can also makes me think of New Year, and not because of champagne-- because of the wine content in cheese fondue, which is our family tradition to eat as our last meal of the year.
And seasonal air obviously associates itself with seasons. The crisp air and earthy decay of fallen leaves laced with smoke of bonfires is a clear indication of autumn. A snowy winter has a dry, empty smell; I can guess when snow is coming by this smell. Spring is wet earth and ozone. And summer is the most chemical: sunscreen, grass, and boat gas.
And this may sound creepy, but I know what the important people in my life smell like. I know the scents of my family members. I can still remember the scent of my best friend from elementary school, what her clothes smelled like and the scent of the pillow I used when I stayed the night. And I know well the scents of people I have lived with (or loved) in my adult life. They're much harder to describe, all of them a mix more or less of sweetness, musk, hair oil, shampoo, perfume/cologne, deodorant, shaving cream, laundry detergent, and BO. I'm sure it sounds nasty when I put it that way, but that's what modern humans smell like. I'm used to it. And in some cases I really like it.
And this is not an exhaustive list. It's very frequently I come across a scent that immediately recalls something for me. It's almost like synesthesia with memory.
Recognizing the powerful link between scent and memory, for my 8th grade science fair project I ran memory tests using distinctive scents (ginger and lemon essential oils)
I ran the experiment in my basement using a set of antique Victorian school desks as my workstation. I had several sets of 10 random objects (toy car, lego, pencil, etc) each glued to shoebox lid "trays." In the control test, subjects studied a tray for (30 seconds? one minute? I forget), took a break for a set amount of time, and then were asked to record as many objects as they could remember. In the variable test, subjects studied the tray while smelling a cotton ball soaked in one of the two scents, took the same break (with no scent), and then were able to smell the scent again while
The experiment didn't prove anything at the time because I was only testing short-term memory, and the only statistically significant data I collected was proving proactive interference because everyone remembered the first set better than the second set regardless of which was scented. (Luckily I had sense enough to expect this, which is why I rotated between scents first and scents second).
However, I did prove something, because now every time I smell ginger I immediately think of those desks in our basement, cotton, and cardboard trays.
(I even wonder if this accounts for why I don't like ginger that much; I was always stressed out during science fair, and I would have been running the experiment in my cold basement during the worst time of the year.
I have an impeccable memory, made even more so by my strong sense of smell (I've started to wonder if I don't pick up on scents more subtle than other people-- which wouldn't surprise me since I often suspect I'm an HSP), so this will take a while.
Baby Magic baby lotion makes me think of, well, being a baby. So does Baby Orajel (which I still sometimes use when I have a sore in my mouth and want to keep from messing with it with my tongue) and Johnson and Johnsonss No Tears baby shampoo. What do I remember from being a baby? The lotion makes me think of being on my changing table and the plastic-encased foam I would have lied on, surrounded by white painted wood bars. I also remember watching Tory as a baby on that same table, picking up and observing things like the red suspenders we owned but I never remember any of us wearing and the tiny white baby booties Mom sometimes would put her in and sing "Shake Your Booty" as she kicked. The Orajel reminds me of teething on the Orajel tube itself and the Orajel leaking through. (Quite an effective teething biscuit, lol). The shampoo makes me think of the uncomfortable way Mom used to rinse the shampoo out of my hair when she bathed me, either dumping cup after cup of water over my head and smearing my hair back with her hands, or, when I got older, forcing my head under the faucet, which I frequently bumped with the back of my head when I came back up again. (So much for "no more tears" /-:). More pleasantly, it reminds me of Mom pulling me into a warm brown bath towel and rubbing my hair as I got out of the bath, singing this song which I'm pretty sure she made up:
I'll bundle a baby, a beautiful baby;
I'll bundle up my baby that I adore.
When she is drying, she is not crying,
So I'll bundle up my baby forevermore.
As you can see, my mom sang a lot. (My mom's songs deserve their own post, frankly. Someone hold me to that; I'll post about it at some point).
Actually, just about all the shampoos I use associate themselves with the times in which I used them, since one tends to smell like their shampoo. I actually didn't stop using No More Tears until I was really old (just like I didn't stop using easy-squeeze bottles of saccharine sweet-flavored toothpaste until I actually complained to my mom that "I want some grown-up spicy toothpaste") because it was just easier for me Mom to buy us all baby products while there was still a baby in the house. (Neil is 7.5 years younger than me). But I remember the Suave Daily Clarifying shampoo I used (without conditioner-- holy Jesus no wonder my hair was such a puffball back then!) in middle school, the anti-chlorine damage shampoo I used during swim team in high school, the Vive Pro Smooth and Frizz-Ease I used during the rest of high school, and I certainly remember the Sunsilk Hydra TLC shampoos and conditioners I used in college since I still love them even now (and am conserving the one bottle I have very dearly, since I have alternatives here). I'm sure I'll associate Herbal Essences (Japan line) Mermaid Moisture with Japan once I leave, if I have the opportunity to smell it again
I also associate body products, the scent of which, like shampoo, linger constantly in order to form distinct memories of an entire time. I had a (rather heinous, looking back) bottle of glittery blue Art Stuff Berry Go Round lotion* from Bath and Body Works in 6th grade (lotion AND glitter in one, what more could you want?) that makes me think of winter that year, when I wore it most. I particularly think of New Year's Eve, which was unique against all other NYEs I've experienced in that we weren't abroad nor at the lake; we went to a family friend's NYE party where they cooked live lobsters. I remember playing with the lobsters on the floor, racing them . . . And then they threw them in the pot, and I was horrified. And then Mom had me try a piece of cooked lobster and I chewed on it for about 45 minutes before I finally spit it out. Poor tough traumatized lobsters )-:
*I tried doing a search for it to see if I could find an image, and I found this webpage which was obviously created more than ten years ago and not updated since. Blast from the past!
I also remember body sprays and perfumes, like the cloying alcoholic peach body spray I kept in my gym locker in middle school. (It was such a bad scent, even more so on me, and yet I was possessive of it and would only use little spurts and got pissed when girls asked to borrow it and did that whole spray-a-massive-cloud-and-then-walk-through-it thing). Bath and Body Works Japanese Cherry Blossom body spray and lotion became my signature scent since I received a bottle after freshman year of college-- but while at times I think of college, since I still use this scent the association is not as strong. However, Robert associates this scent (and that of the Sunsilk Hydra TLC shampoo) with me, so I mailed him a sample, and he mailed me some of his cologne. It probably sounds creepy, but we both acknowledge
Food, of course, has some intense associations. Like most Americans, I associate turkey, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin pie (or pumpkin spice) with Thanksgiving. Christmas is peppermint and pine needles. (Forget chestnuts roasting on an open fire; I never tried a roasted chestnut until I was 16 or so). Grilled meat (and vegetables like zucchini, onions, green pepper, and those ridiculous but oh-so-delicious-in-shish-kabob canned whole potatoes) reminds me of summers at the lake with Dad cooking out. Onions sauteed in butter remind me of weekend mornings when Dad would make his special hash or Bauernfruhstuck. White wine used in cooking makes me think of Sunday dinners when the meal was a little more special and time-consuming and we sometimes ate in the dining room. It can also makes me think of New Year, and not because of champagne-- because of the wine content in cheese fondue, which is our family tradition to eat as our last meal of the year.
And seasonal air obviously associates itself with seasons. The crisp air and earthy decay of fallen leaves laced with smoke of bonfires is a clear indication of autumn. A snowy winter has a dry, empty smell; I can guess when snow is coming by this smell. Spring is wet earth and ozone. And summer is the most chemical: sunscreen, grass, and boat gas.
And this may sound creepy, but I know what the important people in my life smell like. I know the scents of my family members. I can still remember the scent of my best friend from elementary school, what her clothes smelled like and the scent of the pillow I used when I stayed the night. And I know well the scents of people I have lived with (or loved) in my adult life. They're much harder to describe, all of them a mix more or less of sweetness, musk, hair oil, shampoo, perfume/cologne, deodorant, shaving cream, laundry detergent, and BO. I'm sure it sounds nasty when I put it that way, but that's what modern humans smell like. I'm used to it. And in some cases I really like it.
And this is not an exhaustive list. It's very frequently I come across a scent that immediately recalls something for me. It's almost like synesthesia with memory.
