Sunday, April 29, 2012

The Scent of Springtime

Spring is in the air.  I mean that quite literally.  A couple times this past week I've caught a faint whiff of it.  Tonight I smelled it again.  I don't know exactly what it is, but when I smell it I am instantly transported to sometime in my childhood.  Can I describe the smell?  Not really.  For some really strange reason it always makes me think of zwieback toast.  Once, many years ago, I bought some zwieback just so I could taste it.  Unfortunately, this smell of spring smells nothing like the toast tastes, so I cannot explain to you why it pops into my mind.  Perhaps the first time the smell embedded itself into my memory my little brother was eating zwieback?  Anything is possible, I suppose.

The smell is elusive, only letting me catch it's scent when I least expect it, it seems, and not always every year.  In years past I have tried to track it down, but it doesn't seem to emit from a single thing.  Rather, it is more a combination of springiness.  If someone could bottle it, I am certain it would be a very popular fragrance.  The best I can deduce it has pear blossoms, perhaps apple blossoms as well, the earliest hint of lilac, and probably a myriad of other spring blooms.  The scent of newly cut grass is not a part of it, and in fact quite overwhelms the more delicate fragrance of spring.  I think that, despite the fact that it begins in spring, lawn mowing is more a scent of summertime.  The rich greens are much more aggressive than the pale flowers that awaken after the snow and frost have gone away.

It doesn't matter so much to me what exactly it is, I am thankful that it is.  It's my own personal announcement that spring has indeed arrived for another season in my life.  I love that I have been able to share it with my husband, and he, too, is mystified as to its composition.  Hopefully someday when our little man cub is a bit older, spring will surprise us once again with the unfolding of its fragrance, and we will be able to share it with him.  And who knows just what memories it will reawaken in him as he grows older?  Let it be love, joy, and peace.