Home, Sweet Olive
An introductory post for a travel and destination web site, this was written in the style of an editor’s note and explores the powerful association a scent can have and its meaning to a previously devastated city.
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"Home, Sweet Olive" for PlanetEye.com (Screenshot)
(Entire post)
It is often said that the greatest, most powerful associations are made with a person’s sense of smell. A single scent has the power to bring back heady memories with a force that literally washes over you in heavy, cascading waves, sending ice-cold chills down your spine and shocking your consciousness backwards into a nostalgic state. Not all aromas have this energy – the fragrance in question has to have a very singular and direct correlation to an era gone, things remembered, emotions felt. It can bring you back to a place in time, bookmarking you to that moment of your life; it can bring you to a place in geography, conjuring vivid images in your mind’s eye, anchoring you to a solid point
Sweet olive is that distinctive and haunting scent that pervades the air of many New Orleans neighborhoods, and it was this smell that I missed most during my time away from the city of my heart. Though not native to the area, the Osmanthus fragrans has become a popular southern garden staple through the years, and a quick walk under the famous live-oaks of the Crescent City is all it takes to indelibly stamp this richly exotic, luxurious scent into your mind. It is unforgettable: impossibly subtle yet bold, simultaneously. An unexpected whiff caught in a lovely chill breeze is one of the simple pleasures in life that many residents take for granted. Or, for some, took.
There was once a time when a different smell took over the city and try as they might, the innocuous tiny white blossoms could not compete with this new and foreign odor. There was no sweetness in the putrid air that sat heavy and sullen over brokenly flickering lamps and desolate, lonely homes and empty streets. The beautiful fragrance of tea olives, once accepted as unconsciously as any other background, was noticeably absent, stifled in this dense stench that held it in iron grips. Katrina’s reign over New Orleans lasted much, much longer than the week it took to conquer it, and her attention to detail was such that even these unassuming trees were touched and spoiled.
However, New Orleans is a place that doesn’t stay down or still for very long. It is a city where solidarity, strength, and soul compose the core of its people, a city whose essence seeps into your blood and embraces all walks of life for its own. New Orleans has struggled against hardship, fought back scrappily, and laughed with a stranger in a bar about the battle. Every part of this city is made of the same mold (no pun intended!) and every living thing here has a deep, passionate love of this town’s character, working each day to rebuild, from huge community organizations to the smallest flower on the sweet olive trees that perfume the air once again and stronger than ever before.
This is my New Orleans.
