All of our senses are involved in the experience of grief.  We see pictures that remind us of good times with our loved one and they also trigger a longing to see them.  We hear a song that was our loved one’s favorite song, and the depth of emotion tied to the music penetrates deep within our soul.  We touch a treasured possession and feel the presence of our loved one in the fibers of the treasure. Our senses encounter the outward reality that our loved one is not within sight, sound or touch.

Then we smell and the aroma goes deep within us and we experience a feeling that our loved one is in this space and time. We smell our husband’s aftershave lotion.  We inhale our wife’s perfume.  We can taste and smell our mom’s mouthwatering pie. We smell our Grandma’s cookies fresh from the oven.

Today, I opened the door under the bathroom sink and found my husband’s aftershave lotion that I had saved.  As I took the top off the bottle, I closed my eyes and smelled the presence of my husband.  The diffuser was sitting on the counter and instinctively, I put a few drops of the lotion into the diffuser and plugged it in.  Soon the whole bathroom smelled like my husband.  I just stood there surrounded in his smell and felt spiritually hugged.

Smells go deep within us and trigger memories causing an emotional grief that catches us off guard.  The smell lingers and remains within us.  It is as if our loved one’s spirit just swept through us.  We are quiet and still in these precious moments and want to linger with the smell.  It is as if our loved one is alive in the smell and moment.

The seasons of the year bring their unique smells and with them moments of grief as we connect people of our lives to the different seasonal smell.  When I smell fresh cut grass, I think of my husband who loved to mow the lawn.  He spent hours on the lawn mower.  One of my favorite pictures of him is on the mower with his arm raised with his hat in his hand.  The aroma brings a smile along with sadness that I will never see him mow again. 

Spring also brings the smell of freshly plowed fields.  I grew up on a farm and the turning over of the soil takes me back to my childhood of helping my dad in the fields.  I grieve my dad and being “daddy’s little girl.”  A smile though appears as I thank God I don’t have to work in the field or on the farm anymore.  I’m thankful to have been raised on a farm and to appreciate the hard labor and toil of farm life.

Summer brings the morning smells that remind me of Vacation Bible School as a child.  The memory that becomes vivid with the smell is my only memory of my Grandpa Tewell who sat on our front porch as a neighbor picked me up to go to VBS.

The smell of leaves burning in the fall, reminds me of camp and youth groups and the farm.  Some smells bring a flood of memories and people into our minds and our grief turns quickly into a thanksgiving for those who have come before us and the memories of life.  Grief is not always about people, who have died, but about an innocence of childhood that has died or a time that has past.

Winter brings the smell of burning wood in the fireplace or wood burning stove.  While I grew up with a wood burning stove, the smell takes me to the wood burning stove with my husband and the time we just sat in front of it and talked for hours.  The smell brings a longing for one more conversation, one more fire, one more….

The aroma of grief is deep within us.  The smells penetrate every fiber of our being and lingers long after the smell has faded.  Because with the smell comes visions of an event, a moment with a loved one, a time past but vital to our foundation of life or a deep longing to stay in the aroma of life.  Just for a moment, all is well and we transcend time in our grief and experience a moment that all is well within the aroma.

Unfortunately, reality hits us and we grieve with intensity because of the smell, but we may also smile in our grief as we give thanks for the moment of remembrance.

 “Live a life of love just as Christ loved us and gave himself for us as a sweet-smelling offering and sacrifice to God.”                                       Ephesians 5:2