Scent of a man

They say scent is the sense that will most vividly retrieve memories for us. They also say that we're attracted to potential mates by their scent.

I first noticed a man's scent after Ants kissed me goodnight in one of my very first kisses. As I drove home that night I could just faintly detect his scent on my letter jacket.

For years after my breakup with D I knew that I would be able to identify him in a dark room just by the way he smelled--loving and tender, with just a hint of innocence.

One of the proctors for my GMAT wore the same cologne S did when we were together. It was so distracting to me that I was relieved when he was assigned to sit outside the room while we took our test.

Now it is F's scent that I smell on my clothes when I get home at night. My perception of his scent has changed since we started seeing each other. He still smells clean, but he also smells warm and solid.

I know that my perceptions of his scent are reflections of our deepening relationship. I'm glad for the ways that it has already changed, curious to see how it continues to change, and wondering if I'm ignoring messages that part of me already knows.

Rearview mirror

My mom looked up in the rearview mirror and saw me kissing the boy next to me in the back seat. We were on our way home from visiting my teacher's farm and he was the only one left to be dropped off. We were five.

His name was Matthew Paul Miller and while I can't remember the kiss, I can remember the moment in kindergarten when he leaned over and whispered that middle name in my ear. I can remember his blond pixie good looks--my memory enhanced by seeing old school pictures.

And I can remember seeing him again when we were in middle school and I was in a math competition at his school. His blond hair darkened and his body thickened, he didn't seem much taller. I didn't say anything to him. I just hugged the memory of those moments close to me, as I still do when I look in the rearview mirror.

No mistletoe required

Butterflies swirled around my stomach as I climbed the steep, dark stairs up to the projection room. Ants was a flirt with everyone, but the flirting had intensified between us in the weeks preceding this Christmas Eve shift at the theater and I knew that something was going to happen when I got upstairs to share my break with him.

Every girl's first kiss is permanently etched in her memory and mine is the same. I can't describe how the moment came about, but I can't forget how he tasted (like vanilla candy canes), how he smelled and how his lips felt pressed against mine.

I hugged the moment close to me all afternoon. When my mom arrived to take me directly to my grandmother's for oyster stew, I slipped down to the theaters to get a surreptitious kiss goodbye before floating out the doors behind her.