Earlier this week, one of my roommates disposed of some expired tuna, or at least that’s what I deduced it was, based on the smell it left behind. The aroma lingered in our kitchen for at least two days. During that time I compulsively checked our trash bags and ran the garbage disposal in an attempt to locate the source of the odor, to no avail. Even though the rotten tuna smell plagued me during time that it thrived in my kitchen, thinking about it now reminds me of beloved afternoon adventure from my childhood.
When I was in fourth grade, I spent half of my week long spring vacation with my grandmother in her home in Darien, Connecticut. The apex of my stay was a day trip to New York City, where we walked through Central Park and visited the Museum Of Modern Art.
My memories of the art in the MoMa are somewhat hazy, but I do recall a creepy exhibit featuring sculptures made of wire and severed doll parts. After passing a bouquet of bald baby-doll heads, Granny suggested with a signature Texan “oh dear” that we fast-forward through the rest of the exhibit and get lunch in the museum restaurant.
In the contemporary white dining room, I ordered the angel-hair pasta. Before that afternoon, I had never heard of the term for that specific type of spaghetti. Its whimsical name enchanted me, but also brought to mind the shorn wooden scalps I had seen mere minutes earlier.
My grandmother ordered a soup and salad combination, as well as a tuna fish sandwich for us to split. However, we were both too full to enjoy the sandwich, so we had it wrapped up and took it with us on the train ride back to Connecticut. Sadly, the tuna could not endure the trek. As the train passed a cluster of police horses, the woman seated next to my grandmother remarked,
As this past week began to wind down, the smell gradually dissipated. Two days after the seemingly source-less stench first came into my life, Granny left it, dying peacefully in her sleep. Was this whiff of a memory her way of saying goodbye?
It was definitely an unconventional farewell, but perhaps that's the way it was meant to be.
For, like an odor looming somewhere between the smell of a once-good tuna sandwich and that of horse manure, messages from passed love ones are often mysterious and unforgettable.
When I was in fourth grade, I spent half of my week long spring vacation with my grandmother in her home in Darien, Connecticut. The apex of my stay was a day trip to New York City, where we walked through Central Park and visited the Museum Of Modern Art.
My memories of the art in the MoMa are somewhat hazy, but I do recall a creepy exhibit featuring sculptures made of wire and severed doll parts. After passing a bouquet of bald baby-doll heads, Granny suggested with a signature Texan “oh dear” that we fast-forward through the rest of the exhibit and get lunch in the museum restaurant.
In the contemporary white dining room, I ordered the angel-hair pasta. Before that afternoon, I had never heard of the term for that specific type of spaghetti. Its whimsical name enchanted me, but also brought to mind the shorn wooden scalps I had seen mere minutes earlier.
My grandmother ordered a soup and salad combination, as well as a tuna fish sandwich for us to split. However, we were both too full to enjoy the sandwich, so we had it wrapped up and took it with us on the train ride back to Connecticut. Sadly, the tuna could not endure the trek. As the train passed a cluster of police horses, the woman seated next to my grandmother remarked,
"Phew. I can smell those horses from here."Granny later confessed with a guilty giggle that she thought the offending odor had emanated from her white paper bag.
As this past week began to wind down, the smell gradually dissipated. Two days after the seemingly source-less stench first came into my life, Granny left it, dying peacefully in her sleep. Was this whiff of a memory her way of saying goodbye?
It was definitely an unconventional farewell, but perhaps that's the way it was meant to be.
For, like an odor looming somewhere between the smell of a once-good tuna sandwich and that of horse manure, messages from passed love ones are often mysterious and unforgettable.
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