Saturday, November 13, 2010

The Nose

We should simply call my second son, The Nose. He sniffs out even the most obscure smells. From a very early age he would comment on how the road smells on a hot day, the stink of his baby brother's spit-up or determine if he would like something or not from the scents wafting up to his little schnozer. A couple of weeks ago we had a FHE on the fly as we were driving dinner to Daddy (standing duty) that night. We were talking about our senses and how blessed we were to have them. Josiah mentioned his favorite sounds and the things they made him think of. We then moved on to the sense of smell. This was Gavin's forte. While the rest of us mentioned such things as molasses cookies, pizza and flowers, Gavin's were more unique. He loves the smell of ice-"it just smells nice and cold", the smell of horses-"makes him think of Grandad and his work clothes", and the smell of the outside of a gas station-"makes me think of trips to Oklahoma".

So, when he came to me this morning wearing a shirt pulled from his drawer claiming it smelled "just like Grammy's house", I just had to have a sniff. I bunched the shirt up, tucked my nose in, closed my eyes...and smelled the warm scent of the Applegate home.

8 comments:

Mamapierce said...

What a fun ability Gavin has! :D

Grammy said...

I heart is about to burst! I love you all so much. Can't wait to actually touch you! Little Gav cracks me up, his Papa smells everything. He has since the day I met him. It must be an Applegate thing. Maybe some Applegate boys have a stronger smell factor than the others. It only stand to reason tha it would be Gavin! He is one in a million!!

holyoak said...

The sense of smell is very tightly connected with memory. Just as Gavin mentioned smells are linked to his memories. The smell of very specific diesel engine exhaust reminds me of double decker buses in Hong Kong and I am far from having Gavin's sense of smell. He must've inherited that from Papa.

whitney said...

Ahhh, that's the cutest thing ever. Cute little Gavin and his strong little nose.

I feel his pain...having quite the sense of smell myself, I understand the cons along with the pros :P

Andrea said...

That is so sweet, Liberty. Aww..I often will smell something that will take me back to when I was a little girl, or when my girls were little. Such a wonderful blessing. Thanks for sharing and giving me something else to be thankful for. Love it!

Anonymous said...

He is such a crack-up!! He truly DOES smell everything. Very trade-mark Gavie...makes me smile when I think about it. When Phillip and I read your post he laughed and thought that maybe Gav was my baby by accident. He's always laughing about how I smell things. The smell of gas stations remind me of family trips, too. I can't wait to squeeze that little man. Give him a hug from me today that will tide him over when I can do it myself. ;)

Unknown said...

He sounds like my Samantha! The story of the shirt smelling "just like Grammy's house" is just adorable!

Aubrey said...

So cute - I love it. I wonder if that will make him more sensitive when his wife is pregnant? (years down the road of course:)