Four C-scents

I have a bad short-term memory. I think that's likely a result of my self-diagnosed ADD (read: lack of focus). But, my long-term memory is good, maybe even better than most. I don't know why, but I suspect that a scent-based sensory relation to these moments helps maintain them. A specific scent wafts during the memory-making moment, and lodges itself in my nasal chambers. 

Just ask "Chicago," who has often received a text message hello prompted by a random scent-inspired reminder--the air freshner beads in a convertible Audi's ashtray. They smelled fresh; they were part of a fresh experience. The scent was clean and soap-like, something that may be named "linen" or "laundry" on its package. 

Once the beads whittled down to molecules, acting as tiny hour-glasses timing the trip, they attached to my nostrils to stowaway and travel back with me. They lay low, undercover, until they sneeze and release a slight sliver of their scent--reminding me of that first frolic through the CHI, and the drives in the convertible Audi that held them, and the driver who bought them and placed them in that ashtray. 

There is another memory-laden scent that sparks a smile and a throwback visual. But this ode is to an odor that I helped create--I contributed the cologne; the other, the cigarettes. Two common particles created a unique perfume. I love this smell, despite its carcinogen. 

This scent, unlike its Chicago kin, does not self-release. I provoke it; I go to the source and breathe the cologne in again. And then I mesmerize into memories: walking into the kitchen where my favorite Nescafe was made, sitting on a couch in front of the DREAM channel, and watching a ba3bosa rise to greet Abu Mazen's motorcade; there's a heater and a window in that scent too. A Rukab hide-and-seek, a Nadia Ali song, and a Khaled Hosseini book are all included. Never mind that these memories were created before the concocted cologne had been--these are the thoughts I'm most fond of, and so I force the connection.

And that is how I remember long-term: through scent, through sense. 

Maybe this will work for chocolate...a whiff of cocoa to remember my last indulgence, and prevent the next one. No...no...the chocolate intake is too frequent; eating choco becomes a short-term memory. So my ADD allows me to forget, and, therefore, allows me to repeat ;-)