Fascinating stuff as ever Ant. Of all the senses, smell does indeed seem most able to rouse the feelings of long ago events, even when we can’t recognise what those events were and when they took place. For many years the smell that set my heart racing with anxiety was that of new leather. It took me back to my first terrifying days at grammar school with the satchel my parents had scrimped to buy.
Fascinating stuff as ever Ant. Of all the senses, smell does indeed seem most able to rouse the feelings of long ago events, even when we can’t recognise what those events were and when they took place. For many years the smell that set my heart racing with anxiety was that of new leather. It took me back to my first terrifying days at grammar school with the satchel my parents had scrimped to buy.