The scent of an Angel

I know that this blog is normally where I joke, rant, and pun but something happened last night. Something beautiful that I feel the need to share....

While sitting outside on the back deck last night, I had a very special visitor. My mom, my youngest daughter, and I were sitting at the patio table rambling about this and that. The sun had already started to fade into darkness. The night time sounds of the frogs, crickets, neighbor's dogs, and local traffic provided the classic summer sounds of normality. Then it happened.

This smell. It hit me- smack in the face. A sweet scent of a familiar comfortableness that seemed replaced by a void of blankness for some time. I knew that smell. I knew it like I know the sound of my own voice. I inhaled harder and harder taking it in as every single hair along my arms and the back of my neck stood at attention.

"Do you smell that?" I said to my mother, in between my deep inhaling of the sweet aroma.

She shook her head and gave me a bit of a look as if I were crazy. In an instant the smell was gone. Not even a lingering afterthought left behind.

We went about our conversation and I simply disregarded the scent as something I wanted to smell, not an actual happening. The memory can be a fickle instrument of illusions when it comes to matters of the heart.

A few moments later, my nostrils almost burnt with the smell coming so strong again, yet so sweetly. Sniffing and sniffing, I tried to chase down the source of the smell like a hunting dog. Though, as swiftly as it returned it was gone.

I looked at my mom. Puzzled at the hunt for this mystery scent, she smiled.
"You don't smell it do you?" I asked as my eyes flooded with tears, half out of placing the exact memory of that scent and half for fear that my mother was starting to think that I finally teetered over that thin line between sanity and insanity.

Just as the tears began to trickle down the sides of my cheeks, my mother- her eyes widened, her back stiffened, and she too- SHE was inhaling the sweet smell just as I was. This time, the scent stayed- strong and lovely- like our guest was sitting in the empty seat between us.

That isn't all. Life went silent. No sounds of frogs, crickets, or dogs. Traffic noise did not exist. A low flying plane coming into the airport coasted just above the trees, silently. The only sounds were our own voices and our sniffing.

"I smell her." My mom said.

She didn't say it or that...she said her.

"I'm not crazy." I laughed. "What does it smell like?"
"Like her. Just like her" mom replied as she continued to inhale.
"Avon and baby wipes." I laughed.
"Yep."
We both breathed in her scent as our face flooded with tears.

"Hey Mama." My mom beamed."

I said nothing. Not a word to her. I knew she was there. My long lost best friend. My dearest, sweetest grandmother.

And in a snap... It was gone. No lingering smell to trace. And the noise of the world returned just as before- as if someone had un-muted life...But this time, the sounds of birds- all sorts of birds circled around us- will the sun now down fully. The hair on my arms and the back of my neck slowly returned to normal as we chases the scent- Sniffing flowers, our clothing, linen hanging over the rails of the deck to dry. The smell was gone- not on anything. Of course it wasn't. That smell only graced one human in that way.

Inside, where my youngest was napping in the living room- the spot beside him was cool.. It wasn't even cool- It was cold- but in an unusual warm, comfortable way. I have no words for the feeling of that spot. Not a vent nor window near it. As my husband said, a good 20 degrees cooler in that one spot than just a foot away. I just stood there, in this haze of coolness. The hair along my arms raised again. I felt more relaxed standing in that one spot than I have in months. I stayed there until the feel left- as fleeting as it had on the back deck.

Not a soul in this house doubt that my grandmother came for a visit, but why? My mom says it was just a visit. A reminder that she is still here for us. But one thing that I surely got from my grandmother is always having something to say. That was the strongest connection that I have ever felt to someone that has left me- passed on- I do not think she would have made it so very obvious that she was around as a casual "hello".

The coldness inside, near my sleeping son- happened to be right in front of one of the china cabinets. The one holding the most memories of her. The coldest spot was where, inside the glass, is a photo of her own parents- My great-grandparents. I picked it up. I honestly even sniffed it to see if it also smelled like her. It didn't.

But even if my thick head never figures out the meaning of her visit, I could smell her. She knew how much that meant to me.

When my father passed away, I kept a shirt of his- one that he wore often. I placed it inside of a ziplock bag and safely tucked it into an empty shelf in my dresser. Often, I would run to the bag and open it just long enough to smell my dad. Especially on holidays or when I felt like I really needed him. Eventually, time had passed and it seemed I had to have the shirt to remind me of that exact smell that no one in the world had besides my dad. I suppose I ran to that shirt a bit too much. One day, I opened the bag to sniff- and it only smelled like a shirt. Just a plain normal tshirt. There was no lingering scent of my dad. And just like that, I couldn't recall a bit of that smell. I knew what shampoo he used, his cologne, even his tooth paste, but all of those together, they still didn't smell like him. Every person has their own scent. And if you love someone- it is a sweet scent that could never be duplicated. When I lost my father's scent for good. I called her. I called my grandmother.

I cried my eyeballs out-and just rambled.... and she let me. I'm sure that she thought I was silly for being so frantic over the scent of a man that had been gone for two years but......

Oh my <3....

I do ramble... Don't I??? I suppose I simply can not think without rambling. I get it... I get it now. Thanks blog for letting me ramble- and thanks to my grandmother for making me ramble. It all makes sense. Right now- as I write these very words.

God Bless that woman. My sweet grandmother.
Anne Oxendine Sigmon Godwin
Jan 31, 1932- May 26, 2009

Two years and I can still smell your scent.

Thank you... <3