…a wild and wacky adventure featuring my wandering mind after too much caffeine and very little to do during the day.

There is something weird about me. My nose. It smells. Yes, I know that’s what noses do, but mine does it a little too well. If you know anything about where I am located on a day-to-day basis, then you know that this is very unfortunate for me.

It hasn’t been easy bearing this burden all of my 23 years. The first time I remember being the only one in the room to smell something was in 3rd grade. I sat near this boy that was gross. And when I say “gross” I am not going by 8-year-old girl standards. To this day I remember this kid and his hygiene, which, now that I think about it is pretty sad because he was at the age where his parents were probably still directing him about how often he needed to bathe and clearly they were not stressing the importance of not smelling like a hog. Our desks were in “clusters” (we got to change clusters about every 2 weeks or so) and my group was just over from his. Every afternoon when we got back from our P.E. class he would have sweat pouring down the back of his neck. I was mesmerized at how the droplets appeared out of nowhere and slowly crept from his hairline, down his neck, and then raced to the collar of his shirt where they were absorbed into an ever-growing ring of perspiration.

And then there was the smell. My goodness, the smell. This was my very first encounter with body odor. We had had the talk in P.E. one day when the boys were separated from the girls and we discussed “our changing bodies” (we never got to watch the video though). This was just the preliminary discussion to the one that would happen in 6th grade, The Big One, the one you hear about from the time you step onto the school bus and for years wonder if it is just a part of elementary school lore then BAM! you realize your life is about to change forever and OH MY GOODNESS what is happening to my body, and (if you’re like me) a year later they explain it to you at school.* This first talk just covered things like wearing deodorant, the importance of bathing, etc. Your average health class discussion.

But wow. No one can explain just how offensive body odor really is. This kid smelled like old onions, corn chips, and a rotten potato all at once. And I thought I was going to faint.

I tugged on the sleeve of one of my classmates and nodded in the boy’s direction. I pinched my nose, indicating the presence of stinky smell. She just shrugged. How could she not smell this kid?

This particular classroom had something very special called “The Reading Loft.” My teacher was awesome, we were her last class before retirement, she asks my mother about me at the beauty shop, and I always stop and talk to her whenever I see her around town. She was my favorite. Anyway, whenever we’d all climb up onto The Reading Loft I would make a point to stay as far away from him as I could. I think he liked me though, and my plans were often thwarted.

(Random: My best friend in 5th grade had no sense of smell. I didn’t believe her until I took her to my brother’s exhibit at the science fair and made her smell it. His project was, “Different Types of Mold” or something like that and he had assembled a group of various things with mold growing on them. Cheese, bread, meat, and the worst of all–grease left over from the Fry Daddy. I didn’t even know mold could grow in that stuff, but let me tell you…that is one powerful bad smell. I Jennifer smell all those things, inhaling deeply, and what did she do? Didn’t bat an eyelash, that’s what.)

This is all to say that my nose works. Real good. A few nights during my sophomore year of college I was awakened by the acidic smell of vomit lingering in the air outside of my room. But anyway, the whole reason I am posting this is because I woke up last night smelling the broccoli I had cooked in the soup a few hours before. What little there was left was in the trash and I could smell it all the way back in my bedroom. I thought I was going to vomit.

And then the dogs in my neighborhood started barking, probably at another stinkin’ liberal who decided to vandalize my one remaining yard sign or poop on my lawn (story to come soon), and I wasn’t able to get to sleep again. The End.

*I grew up in the country. I saw cows mating and birthing from a young age so none of this stuff was really a surprise. The way “The Talk” came about for me was when a boy made a crude comment on the bus when I was in 3rd grade, my cousin told his mom, his mom called my mom, my mom asked me about it, I cried (as usual) because I thought I was in trouble, and then my mom had to explain the comment. And that’s how I found out about the birds and the bees. A beautiful experience really. Then I found out Mom only told me half of everything and got The Rest of the Story on the bus. Man, the things you learn on the bus. My children will NEVER ride the bus.