Trying to keep a running schedule during the school year is difficult. The hectic pace drives me from my early morning runs to just fitting them in whenever I can.
I throw my running shoes and shorts into the car every Monday, hoping that an unexpected half-hour might materialize in the week's fast-paced schedule. If it does, I'll head to the school track for a few not-so-quick turns.
The other day, I braved the heat for a lunchtime run. The JROTC boys drilled on the field, a few seniors threw a Frisbee. I traced red ovals on the track, feeling the south wind in my face. It was hot and I looked forward to the cold locker-room shower. Then, it hit me.
A blast of Pei Wei's exhaust blew from three blocks away and onto the track. Pei Wei is a Pan-Asian restaurant with spices that ignite the senses. Oftentimes, the exhaust catches a breeze and travels the neighborhood to light appetites on fire.
But the scent didn't impact my appetite at all. The scent impacted my memory.
How easy it is to slide back into the comfort of memory, the tender arms of the past reaching out, inviting us to sit and stay awhile. Those invisible memory particles travel the jetstream, landing on random olfactory nerves. Many pass through unnoticed, never taking root, never growing. Others bloom. They grow into a full-fledged memory of days past, and the receiver might pause, holding still for a moment to assess the place and time of that thought.
There are easy scents that allow a stroll back to childhood, that call me to remember the important places and people of youth. I can smell my grandfather's pipe tobacco, newly cut Christmas trees, fresh-brewed coffee that my parents made every morning.
With one damp whiff, I can feel the inside of my grandmother's house. I can sense countless happy autumns once a wood-burning fireplace is lit.
The sweet smell of watermelon Now-n-Laters takes me to the neighborhood pool's vending machine. I can still hear my wet feet slapping against the concrete, the quarters dropping in the machine and the gratifying fall of the package from the shelf.
The smell of summer rain takes me to building dams in the creek by my house.
More complex memories drop into my mind with varying aromas. These are memories that are deeper, more important than at the time experienced. The old smell of New Orleans takes me back to Tulane University. A root beer's sweet fizz brings alive a Fourth of July parade. I once refinished the hardwood floors in the first house my wife and I shared. That newly sanded wood smell reminds me of that joyful labor, the one accomplished because a new wife deserves a new husband who will fix up her new house.
There are difficult scented memories, too, like incense wafting through a mourning congregation, candle wax mixing with scented tissues. The smell of a human spirit damaged by loss.
Oftentimes, I think of a student who died still in the whispers of his youth. A car wreck took him away from his family, his friends, his school. A while before that terrible accident, he found himself in trouble with the law and was under eyesight restrictions. This meant he couldn't be out of sight of his parents, his aunt, or his teachers at any time. I remember how hard he had worked to make things right, how the eyesight restriction meant that teachers had to take turns walking him to work after school though it was right around the corner.
There he was again, on that track with me, running alongside with those tired eyes and silly grin. Just a boy, he was. Just a boy. I remember the uniform he wore after school, the one he wore every day as teachers walked him to his job at Pei Wei.
T hrough the breezes of time, we can pick up traces of people we've let go, memories that soar into our brains through unseen clouds. We remember those who lost themselves, whom we lost.
Through the breezes of time, we transport to the past and sit a spell.
Embracing memories is a healthy undertaking, one that plants our feet in our past and drives our hearts and souls into the future. It's okay to let go of the difficult ones. It's okay to allow the scent to travel through our entire bodies as we gain awareness of its presence. And then it's okay to release it back into the sky and move forward on the track of life.
It's okay because there are new memories to seek, new events that lead us in that circle back to the core of happiness that we all possess. When the old scents find us, as they always will, it's okay to smile, to gasp, to shake our heads and wonder why. The easy ones buoy us, the complex ones teach us, the difficult ones make us remember. We remember that all our ups and downs have value, have purpose.
We remember that life is best when lived with passion, with color, with beauty.
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Steve Straessle, whose column appears every other Saturday, is the principal of Little Rock Catholic High School for Boys. You can reach him at sstraessle@lrchs.org.
Editorial on 09/21/2019