For intro: Ah, the sweet smells of home.
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Camel sweat and cow dung
“I fell in love with him because he smelled like horses and leather,” I told Karen. “He swung me up on his rope horse and taught me to ride. Well, the horse taught me to ride. My husband taught me to notice things along the trail. I had a tendency to ride with my head down, looking for rattlesnakes. He taught me instead to pay attention to my horse’s ears, which would twitch and point if he saw a snake along the way. When I didn’t have to worry about snakes, I learned to look out over the land. We rode for fun every evening, often after a work-day in the saddle. That horsey-leather smell still makes me wistful.”
“I grew up on horses,” Karen said. “My favorite smell is a sweaty horse, one that I’ve been running hard and he’s warm and stomping and blowing and full of energy. When I rub him down, I flick the sweat off his rump with my hand. I love that smell.”
We were driving up and down the streets of Harlem at about three miles per hour. It was Friday evening, the day before the school reunion. We were reminiscing, trying to remember just who used to live in the house on the corner, or in the house that is no longer there. We got to talking about how over the years our values have changed. And somehow that led us to talking about good smells.
“Horses,” I said. “That’s probably why I like camel-sweat tea.”
Karen raised her eyebrows. I told her the story. “In ancient times, merchants from China and India carried tea and spices to the Mediterranean countries across the mountains along the Silk Road . The tea leaves became soaked with the camels’ sweat. Every few nights the men had to dry the tea over their campfires, giving it a strong smoky flavor. My friends call it my “stinky tea”. Lapsang Souchong. It’s my favorite.”
“I like the smell of cow dung,” Karen confessed with a side-long look. “Especially when it is fresh and steamy on a cold winter day.”
“Me too. But my favorite is pig. It reminds me of raw brown sugar.”
We burst out laughing. We had both had grown up surrounded by animals. A whiff of scent triggers a host of memories.
This time of year the wild rose and milkweed blossoms and wet dirt drop me back in time to our farm on the Milk River . Once again I’m walking along the irrigation ditch, watching the dirt crumble off the bank into the swift brown water. I’m carrying a jar of iced tea and a fresh cinnamon roll to my Dad. The smells of cut grass and new-mown hay, scooped into windrows in the fields, make me feel rich, though it is neither my grass nor my fields.
When summertime heat has settled in, dust and sagebrush will have me back riding Sputnik again, moving cows to pasture, scanning the sky any the hint of a cloud, praying for rain. Although too many years have passed, memory is vivid.
On return trips to Harlem when my Dad was alive, rolling down the east slope of the mountains into Ellensburg, I could smell the feed lots, the dust and the sage. I was instantly transported to Montana , though I had hundreds of miles to go. The lure of dust and sagebrush eventually reeled me back home for good.
Whiffs from back yard barbeques reminded Karen and I that we had not yet had dinner. We headed home, still puttering along at about three or four miles per hour, remembering, forgetting, laughing and talking, reliving events from forty and fifty years ago. We heard shouts. There were nearly thirty people sitting on a front patio. I recognized a friend waving his arms. He shouted for us to join them for dinner, the barbeque was ready to put on the table. I looked around, the way one does when one is not sure who is really being motioned to. “Yes, you. Come eat with us and meet some of my friends.” We parked along the crowded street and joined the celebrants.
It was nearly dark when we left. Rain hung heavy in the air, along with another familiar night scent. “Now that’s another smell I really like,” I told Karen. “Eau de skunk.”
Sondra Ashton
HDN: Looking out my back door
July 15, 2010
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Showing posts with label dust. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dust. Show all posts
Monday, July 26, 2010
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Dust and Other Dangers
The other day Karen and Ellie and I were chatting. Karen, who lives near Great Falls , had just had new windows installed. Both Ellie and I had previously done the same. What a difference it made at my house! Less dust, less noise and the temperature stays even. Karen mentioned how nice it was to be able to open and close the windows. Until now, as in many vintage homes, several windows in her house had warped or were painted permanently closed. “In fact,” she said, “it was stifling hot last night and for the first time, we were able to open all the windows. This morning the house was nice and cool with the breeze blowing through.”
“Isn’t it dangerous to leave all the windows open in Montana ?” Ellie, who lives in California , asked. Immediately I thought about the homes in her neighborhood which have security systems, barred windows and gated access. We three women grew up in Harlem , where nobody even locked their doors, so I couldn’t imagine what dangers Ellie had in mind. “Not because of burglars,” Ellie continued, “but because of wind and dust.”
The dangers of wind and dust. That statement stumped me. Neither Karen nor I responded further. I thought about tornados and dust storms which, indeed, are dangerous. But I know Ellie meant inside the house.
I love fresh air and often leave my windows open. I also like light, so my only window coverings are gauzy sheers. When the wind blows hard, as it does here on the Hi-line, sometimes my sheer curtains hover nearly perpendicular across the room. If I got up in the night, walked into a curtain blowing across my face, startled, tripped and fell and broke my neck, then, yes, that would be a dangerous wind blowing. But that is a far stretch for even my imagination. As for dust, yes, I had to concede that, for me, dust holds particular danger. And since our eastern Montana wind is always dust-laden, even in the winter, and since, weather permitting, I do keep my windows and doors open, the wind dumps dust into my house.
When I was a child my German grandmother taught me The Way to clean--her way, the only way, the right way. My first job every Saturday morning was to dust; walls, furniture, the ceiling corners, and especially under the beds. Grandma always checked my work, waiting to pounce on any hint of sloppiness. I trembled, anxious that she might find one of those errant gatherings which collect beneath the beds, fluffs which she called slut’s wool. I didn’t exactly know what a slut was, but I knew that if Grandma found a puff of dust, then I was one of those sluts and that was a shameful thing to be. For years, thanks to her training, I feared those dust gatherings. Slut’s wool kept me on the straight and narrow.
I was grown up and married before I heard a friend mention dust bunnies. I had to ask her what that meant. I thought the term was cute but I knew she was trying to prettify sluts’ wool. That was one phrase that could not be dressed up and disguised. To this day when somebody says “dust bunny”, I hear my grandmother’s voice shout “slut’s wool”.
Years later I re-trained myself to be a less compulsive cleaner. Sometimes I can wait long enough between cleanings that the dust bunnies mutate into dust hares. In the winter I often go a month without a thorough housecleaning. But in the summertime, with windows open to the elements and the wind blowing dust into every crevice, I have to clean every couple weeks. But every day I neglect dusting, my grandmother’s voice haunts me with “slut’s wool”.
Today there are notices posted around Harlem informing us that rattlesnakes are moving into town. Snakes terrify me. But I have snake-detector eyes. If a snake creeps into my yard, I will see it. However, I think a perfect hideout for snakes is around my cabin in the garden, where my raspberry patch nestles against the south side of the logs. When I pick raspberries, I have the eagle eye for snakes. And I don’t know if snakes have ears, but one can’t be too careful. So I wear my bear bells. I also talk to the possibility of snakes. “Okay, snakes, I am moving into this cluster of raspberry canes and then I am going to reach under these branches, so if you are here, please vacate the premises for a few minutes. Won’t take me long, just a few more berries and I am out of here.” So far this tactic has worked. I have picked gallons of raspberries and no snakes.
But if I had to meet a rattlesnake in the bushes or my grandmother taunting me with the full implications of “slut’s wool”, I would choose the rattlesnake. Against the rattlesnake, I have more defenses.
Sondra Ashton
Havre Daily News: Home Agin
September 11, 2009
“Isn’t it dangerous to leave all the windows open in Montana ?” Ellie, who lives in California , asked. Immediately I thought about the homes in her neighborhood which have security systems, barred windows and gated access. We three women grew up in Harlem , where nobody even locked their doors, so I couldn’t imagine what dangers Ellie had in mind. “Not because of burglars,” Ellie continued, “but because of wind and dust.”
The dangers of wind and dust. That statement stumped me. Neither Karen nor I responded further. I thought about tornados and dust storms which, indeed, are dangerous. But I know Ellie meant inside the house.
I love fresh air and often leave my windows open. I also like light, so my only window coverings are gauzy sheers. When the wind blows hard, as it does here on the Hi-line, sometimes my sheer curtains hover nearly perpendicular across the room. If I got up in the night, walked into a curtain blowing across my face, startled, tripped and fell and broke my neck, then, yes, that would be a dangerous wind blowing. But that is a far stretch for even my imagination. As for dust, yes, I had to concede that, for me, dust holds particular danger. And since our eastern Montana wind is always dust-laden, even in the winter, and since, weather permitting, I do keep my windows and doors open, the wind dumps dust into my house.
When I was a child my German grandmother taught me The Way to clean--her way, the only way, the right way. My first job every Saturday morning was to dust; walls, furniture, the ceiling corners, and especially under the beds. Grandma always checked my work, waiting to pounce on any hint of sloppiness. I trembled, anxious that she might find one of those errant gatherings which collect beneath the beds, fluffs which she called slut’s wool. I didn’t exactly know what a slut was, but I knew that if Grandma found a puff of dust, then I was one of those sluts and that was a shameful thing to be. For years, thanks to her training, I feared those dust gatherings. Slut’s wool kept me on the straight and narrow.
I was grown up and married before I heard a friend mention dust bunnies. I had to ask her what that meant. I thought the term was cute but I knew she was trying to prettify sluts’ wool. That was one phrase that could not be dressed up and disguised. To this day when somebody says “dust bunny”, I hear my grandmother’s voice shout “slut’s wool”.
Years later I re-trained myself to be a less compulsive cleaner. Sometimes I can wait long enough between cleanings that the dust bunnies mutate into dust hares. In the winter I often go a month without a thorough housecleaning. But in the summertime, with windows open to the elements and the wind blowing dust into every crevice, I have to clean every couple weeks. But every day I neglect dusting, my grandmother’s voice haunts me with “slut’s wool”.
Today there are notices posted around Harlem informing us that rattlesnakes are moving into town. Snakes terrify me. But I have snake-detector eyes. If a snake creeps into my yard, I will see it. However, I think a perfect hideout for snakes is around my cabin in the garden, where my raspberry patch nestles against the south side of the logs. When I pick raspberries, I have the eagle eye for snakes. And I don’t know if snakes have ears, but one can’t be too careful. So I wear my bear bells. I also talk to the possibility of snakes. “Okay, snakes, I am moving into this cluster of raspberry canes and then I am going to reach under these branches, so if you are here, please vacate the premises for a few minutes. Won’t take me long, just a few more berries and I am out of here.” So far this tactic has worked. I have picked gallons of raspberries and no snakes.
But if I had to meet a rattlesnake in the bushes or my grandmother taunting me with the full implications of “slut’s wool”, I would choose the rattlesnake. Against the rattlesnake, I have more defenses.
Sondra Ashton
Havre Daily News: Home Agin
September 11, 2009
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