Peter: Scents of Childhood

Given that my professional life is dedicated to fragrance, I wish my childhood was dominated by the overwhelming need to smell the impossibly beautiful. Or, do I?  My childhood was shockingly normal, and will never end up on the shelves of WHSmith as an example of how-not-to-parent, or be-parented. My memories barely light the corners of my mind, but have a sepia tone that has been much used in examples of the Great Lost British Childhood.  Nobody died, nobody divorced, and arguments were kept to a frantic, hushed whisper (in case the neighbours were to hear, the ultimate early seventies indignity).

So, what smells remind me of that retrospectivally idyllic childhood?

The first would be the overwhelmingly normal odour of vegetables boiling (this was years before a steamer was found in Birkenhead) as I came in muddied and sweating from a day of tree-climbing.  I loathed that smell.  Suddenly Luke Skywalker was no longer an inter-galactic hero, but a normal Northern boy about to be served mince and greens.  The resentment I felt was astonishing.  Clarity of mind and the ability to swing a fabulous LightSabre was replaced by a hatred of the normality of my life.

My second is easy:  the smell and taste of vegetables grown in what was known as "the patch" - the area of garden in between the manicured section, and the wilds of my "bit".  Well, not just my bit, but my best friend Graham's as well.  There we played, fought, imagined.  And stole. Big, luscious peas that seemed to throb with an intensity now hard to imagine.  Tomatoes, so plump and warm.  Nettles, the ultimate enemy to our play that stung our bare arms and legs.  But the dock leaves were there to assuage any grazes. Genius, pure genius.

The third scent is one that I don't want to remember with any false nostalgia. This is the part that makes me the man who loves fragrance.  I can't say that this is based on one experience - it's not.  But, if I want to recall happiness, and comfort, it's this...

My parents were slightly different from the other parents I knew. My father had travelled all over the world and brought things back like Tiger Balm, and Tiger's Eye Gemstones. Funny that my two recollections involved tigers, as I have absolutely no recollection of him bringing back a killer cat.  My Mum would have been furious.  What would Aunty Freda and Stella have said, as they were being savaged?
"Lilian, dear, put a lead on your tiger?"  The mind boggles.  And boggles back to reality...

What my Dad did have access to was Duty Free.  There was a huge glamour to those words in 1972, and it meant that I always received a Toblerone from my Dad's tan briefcase when her returned from his travels.  Being allowed to open that briefcase on my father's return allowed a rush of chocolate and leather to my nose, which makes me realise why I love Mugler's Angel.

It also meant that in our house we had Fine Fragrance, a category probably not that well-known in Rock Ferry.  I don't know what my Mum owned, but the smells were so rich, so expensive, so complicatedly divine that I can recall them so clearly now.  The humdrum stopped.  The house no longer smelled of boiling cabbage and chops, but a magical, mystical place where all dreams were possible.  Of course, that would fade quickly, and my love affair with the temporary and supefricial began in earnest...

          [by PETER]