The Scent Hangs In The Air
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The scent of perfume hangs in the air, but I don’t know where it comes from. Oddly, I’m sitting in my chair, and this smell occasionally permeates the air around me.
But no one is here but me, and I’m not wearing perfume. I haven’t reached for it in the bathroom cabinet for weeks.
It’s like someone is waving a perfume-scented wand around me.
I googled this phenomenon to try to make sense of a scent where there should be none.
It is called Phantosmia, or Olfactory Hallucinations. This is the medical term for perceiving a smell that isn’t there. Various things can cause it:
- Nose or Sinus Problems: Sinusitis or other nasal issues can sometimes trigger phantom smells.
- Nervous System or Brain Conditions: Migraines, stroke, epilepsy, or even certain brain tumors can be associated with phantosmia.
- Other Medical Conditions: Certain medications, Parkinson’s disease, or aging can also play a role.
- Temporary Glitches: In some cases, it might be a temporary glitch in your brain’s processing of sensory information.
So, neurological issues, sinus infections, or exposure to strong scents can trigger sensory perceptions. Is my brain playing tricks on me? Is it aging?
Anxiety can be associated with experiencing phantom smells, but I’m not feeling at all anxious. I’m listening to piano music, and it’s peaceful here in my home. I didn’t think to write about it until the scent wafted past me a number of times—until it became a little unsettling.
My brain seems to be perceiving a smell that isn’t actually present. I’ve never experienced this before. I can’t say if the scent is floral, warm, or woody. It’s just powerful. It merely hangs in the air for a few moments and then retreats.
The Scent Of Perfume:
It reminds me of being a child and my great-grandmother taking me around to visit her neighbor friends. When I’d enter their house, smells would greet me—the smell of cooking, fresh air from an open window, or maybe a bouquet on the table.
Description of perfume: Perfume is a mixture of fragrant essential oils or aroma compounds (fragrances), fixatives, and solvents. It’s usually in liquid form and used to give the human body, animals, food, objects, and living spaces an agreeable scent.
Perfume is often associated with the divine and can symbolize a connection with the sacred or a spiritual awakening. Anointing yourself with perfume can signify a desire for self-improvement, healing, and spiritual growth. It can also be a sign of joy and abundance in your life.
There is a strangeness when something happens that you can’t explain. Something I can’t at all account for. Something mysterious is happening in my living room. The term is inexplicable.
Albert Einstein once said, “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.”
Introverts & Observations:
Introverts often observe things others don’t notice, while extroverts are busy conversing and being social. Some introverts are said to have heightened powers of empathy.
People like me see a bird’s color flashing up in a tree. Nature is a balm to our souls. We sit in it with serenity and watch all that is around us.
Are you familiar with the German word “Sehnsucht?” It roughly means an inconsolable yearning or wistful longing for something one cannot explain or know.
Someone wrote, “The feeling of Sehnsucht only came to me once I was alone, undistracted, in a calm setting, and a reflective mood—when I was happy and at peace alone.”
I live my life hoping for mostly calm settings and peace, and I genuinely enjoy being alone. The things that come to me in this setting are common but beautiful, embracing the world my imagination creates. I don’t live for the highs or the extremes—just the ordinary moments.
And so the wafting perfume cannot be explained. I tell myself it is just another of life’s many mysteries, and I don’t need to know why. I’ll just enjoy it while it lasts and hope it isn’t a lesion on my brain or some such oddity.
It tells me that I might want to choose a gardenia plant or Confederate jasmine for my garden this year. Or maybe roses, lavender, or honeysuckle to strongly scent the air. So I can walk outside and smell fragrant flowers all around me.
“Smell is a potent wizard that transports you across thousands of miles and all the years you have lived.” – Helen Keller.
National Introverts Week, founded by Matthew Pollard, is celebrated annually during the third week of March. Established to encourage introverts to be proud of who they are, this week aims to change stereotypes and confront the stigma often associated with introversion.
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LOL, my first thought was a ghost too! A friendly one, of course, or she might have unleashed a skunk smell, instead of something pleasant! 😂
Funny, because I had a phantom smell just this afternoon, but it was outside. I was walking by the side of my house and got a wave of a perfumy flower, like gardenias or something. Absolutely nothing is in bloom here yet and no neighbors were outdoors, so very strange.
You are lucky my phantom smell is cigarette smoke. I read that is a menopause symptom to have phantom smells.
Maybe it is the ghost of a former occupant and that is her way of letting you know she loves what you’ve done to the house.
very sweet
P.S. It just occurred to me. Oklahoma is being battered by strong winds from the current storm system, just like where I live in SE Wisconsin, for the past 2-3 days, including today, it hasn’t stopped at all. The scent of perfume you’re smelling may be penetrating from a broken bottle of scent through the old walls of Mamie because of the strong relentless hammering winds our states are experiencing. They’ve been non-stop where I live since about noon starting on Friday through today. Last night we had torrential downpours of rain and strong winds, the noise woke me up about 2 a.m. The winds have continued today but the rains stopped before sunrise, thank goodness! We’re already soggy because of the snow melt we had from the last storm. Earlier Friday sustained wind guests exceeding 50 mph were forecast so for the first time in living here nearly 11 years I moved my recycling and trash carts into the garage – just in case. Fortunately, no downed branches from my pine trees like during the wind storms last year, but you can’t be out walking unless you’re unusually strong and can stay on your feet when one of those gusts hits you. I’m watching some news broadcasts now on You Tube showing wind damage caused and by the strong wind gusts (not tornadoes) and wild fires pushed by the strong winds in Arkansas, just horrible.
perhaps you have something blooming outside that you didn’t know about. Star Jasmine can smell like some of the best perfume ever. maybe take a walk around the outside of your house? or those silly kittens have found something and scattered it.
Leave it to the internet to make it a mental thing. My guess is the stripper may have dropped a bottle somewhere or used a lot and it’s permeated into the walls or floors or whatever. 🙂
But I only smelled it starting yesterday and I still smell it today. What you wrote made me laugh!
Lucky YOU! My phantom scent is burnt wet wood. A dose of steriod from my doctor cleared it up after I’d suffered with it for months. Before my doctor’s appointment my daughter reminded me that I’d had it before and it came right before migraines. I’d forgotten that!
That’s interesting. I’d rather smell perfume than burnt wet wood!
The first thing I would do is hunt around the house for something that would emit the odor you’ve smelled. My thought is that the kitties got into something and it’s hidden somewhere under a piece of furniture, under an area rug, maybe on a window sill hidden behind a blind.
I only smell it when I sit in the chair. But those kitties surprise me with what they manage to do!
I sometimes smell a cigarette as if someone is smoking…
Maybe it’s a ghost of a past occupant, and maybe that’s what it is here.
When I still lived with my parents I would sometimes wake up in the middle of the night and I could clearly smell yeast bread baking in the oven. I was puzzled as to why my mom would be baking at that time of the night so I would get up and go to the kitchen, but no one was there. It was weird. Also, about 3 days after my mom passed away I woke up one night because I was so aware of her presence. I sat up in bed and I could clearly smell her scent – a mixture of cooking smells and her favorite body talc. My sister has also experienced the same.
Wow, that’s something! I’d love the scent of bread yeast.
Like someone here said, it could be a scent that was previously already IN the house…. it can get into the wood or any fabrics sometimes and remain there for a long time. I also believe a long lost loved one can bring a certain scent to us. After my son died, I smelled cigarette smoke now and then, for years, when I was not around anyone who was smoking! I know it was from him, or at least the smells I associated with him were still lingering somewhere in my brain. I would even smell it while I was driving. After I had COVID 3 years ago, I would smell awful smells in my house, for a good year.. and after some research, did read that it happened to many after having COVID.. those gas-like burned ash smells, but eventually it went away. I suppose our nose glands (not sure medical name) can somehow get damaged from COVID. Glad your mysterious scents are pleasant!
Marilyn
Yeah, at least it’s a pleasant scent! But strong.
I think Mamie has loved your renovations and the activity of the kittens. You brought beauty and love and family and serenity to Mamie and she is saying thank you.
I do love Mamie! Happiness lives in this house.
Thank goodness it is a pleasant occurrence.
Do you notice it when you wear a mask?
Can cats smell?
When did you first notice it?
Could it be from something like a new rug or furniture ?
I began smelling it yesterday morning. And I smell it today too.
I have never in my 85 years heard of something like this. Your first two comments are “Maybe it’s a ghost”. I didn’t think that until I read it here. Not spooky at all, I like to think it is a spirit or ghost too. A very nice ghost that is welcoming you to Mamie.
Yes, I think of it as a nice ghost too.
Mamie is an old house. Maybe she has a ghost?
I would think, if that phenomenon is true, that in 104 years there might be quite a few ghosts lingering.
Are you sure it’s not a ghost? After all, Mamie is over 100 years old so people probably have died there at some point.
That’s kind of what I’m thinking. After Covid I couldn’t smell much at all. This seems to be a strong scent to me, and my sense of smell is back.