Follow your nose
I was standing in the heart of a boreal forest, deeply inhaling the intoxicating perfume. Every breath seemed to purge whatever was ailing me—politics, travel, lack of sleep. It was so pure. I drank deeply you might say, and then curiosity kicked in. I wondered what made up the mix of this bouquet? I spent a good part of the next hour sniffing about, gently rubbing leaves, pushing a fingernail into stems, or breaking off a needle from coniferous trees. There were many to choose from—fir, cedar, spruce, hemlock, and pines—and I came to realize their smells were all distinctive. And what about the annuals and perennials? These self-assigned curiosities can keep me busy for hours, and while I may never really know the olfactory blend of an exact moment, with the wind rubbing against new plants and constantly enhancing the essence, I was able to learn a dozen unique smells, some pungent, some sweet, some spicy, and some quite gentle, subtle background notes if you didn’t stop and focus.
My son’s dog is one of my favorite beings—humans included. Off leash, vigorously exploring this southern Rocky Mountain landscape, her nose is on overdrive. Unlike me, she has dual-channel olfaction. Scents come into two channels, which helps her decide direction, and to pinpoint the source of a smell. My two nostrils feed into one channel. And get this, depending on the bred, dogs can smell 10,000 to 100,000 times more acutely than humans. It explains why Maya is in the kitchen three seconds after the chicken is taken out of the refrigerator. I wonder if I would be overwhelmed by so many options? How would I sort out necessary smells, leading me to food, avoiding a problem, and enjoying others that are just pleasant?
Her busy walks are like deep dives into a neighborhood newspaper, learning not just who was here, but other deep details, like what they ate for breakfast, how old they are, and what sex they are. Dogs can sniff out cancer, or covid, or the scent of a banana I ate before landing in Tokyo. It was a little Customs beagle who sat by my daypack in baggage claim, confident he would get a treat for busting me. Agents couldn’t find anything in the bag, the fruit-sniffing doggy cop was confident and remained sitting next to the bag. I was shown a poster of fruits, cheese, meats, and other contraband. I pointed to a banana, and then to my stomach. I got off without charge, and the nose still got a treat.
By habit, I roll down the car window whenever I drive into nature. It must be the ancient dog in my genes that needs to sniff. 27 miles of logging roads take me to a Northwoods camp. I roll down the window as soon as I leave pavement, letting in the fragrant scents of pine, spruce, and cedar. My window goes down the entire drive of the Big Sur coast. In all but the most horizontal of storms, for a dozen years I would roll down my window driving north across the Golden Gate Bridge. The Pacific energy was most often bracing, but it was the ride up the Marin Headlands that made me think of a chef, who in preparing to roast a chicken would only need to roll the bird across the hills next to the bridge. Rosemary, touches of fennel, and a splash of eucalyptus.
There was a unique herbal smell that rode the air when I went for a daily run along the road to Lamington National Park in Queensland. Phil Collins’ In the Air Tonight was sweeping across Australia when I was there, and the two came together in my mind. What was that smell? I liked it, and it kept me busy trying to find it. It was partly a citrus smell, lemony. Yes, like lemongrass. Part herbaceous, unique, like dill. I would first notice it on a particular curve, and on several occasions I stopped to sniff around. I finally found it. I had been fooled into looking for something flowery or large. It was in fact a nondescript grass, and particularly abundant on that corner.
Smells can connect memories from far away places. Sipping Earl Grey tea, smelling and tasting the touch of bergamot oil added to the black tea leaves, I am transported to a west-central Wisconsin landscape, where in and around the scruffy jack pine forests, growing in the sandy soil, is bergamot. Its minty perfume rises on hot days or after a rain. Another sip of tea and I am off remembering more of that landscape, how sweetfern would also add a perfect nuance to the air, where I found a rare gentian growing in the sand, and how I learned that jack pines needed fire to open their cones and let the seeds free. Or walking into a damp musty cellar, its dank smell takes me back in time, downstairs in many old homes. Dust and soot caught in old cobwebs, mold growing on the hand-hewn stone walls. Recently I was lying under a giant pine growing along a cascading snowmelt river in the middle of Corsica. I closed my eyes listening to the roar of the water, and as the sun warmed the carpet of last fall’s pine needles, I rolled and heard them crunch. A gentle fragrance was released that transported me back to pine needle beds I have laid on. In Yosemite’s granite high country, under a red pine at the top of a Wisconsin cliff, and beneath a prominent white pine where I slipped into a nap along a northern lake.
I am typing these last words inside the studio, with the windows open. If I stop and focus, I do not smell anything. At the same instant, Maya wakes from a nap. She sits up with her nose in the lead, and she sniffs. She sniffs some more, and then insists upon going out. I sniff again, and again smell nothing. I let her out so we can follow her nose.
I’m not sure I would want a photograph of my nose leading off a post, so to be fair, here she is from a more complimentary perspective.