Scent-Triggered Memories

by Tracey Flower

I have always been intrigued by the power of smell. Not the sense just on its own, but the connection of scent and memory, the power scent has to evoke emotions or to recover a feeling from long ago, to send me back to a moment like no other sense can. 

This happened just the other day.

The smell was of warm earth and fresh water. You know the way soil and foliage smell when it’s a little bit damp and been warmed by the sun? It’s rich and powerful, organic and sometimes maybe a little too strong and you taste it in the back of your throat. It was that smell. It was that smell woven into the smell of fresh flowing water. It’s the way lakes or rivers smell in the summer and it reminded me of so many sun-soaked and sparkling long summer days. 

It reminded me of walks with my mom down by the marina in South Haven, Michigan; of the way the air smells when we walk on the pier at dusk. It reminded me of the stillness of the lake and the sky at that time of day.

It also reminded me of the wonderful chaos of the previous weekend’s rafting trip in Utah, of camping, swimming and laughing with dear friends. And I replayed the weekend to be sure I had all the best details saved for future reference—the muddy drive to the campsite in an evening thunderstorm, the views of the surrounding canyons the next morning, and, yes, even the time the raft flipped and spilled us out into the churning Colorado River. 

I know I will think about this weekend less and less as the days and weeks pass and new experiences are had and memories made, but I also know I will be reminded of it the next time that rich smell floats my way again and I look forward to that moment. 

What smells trigger memories for you?

Exploring Pure Michigan

by Tracey Flower

A few weeks ago I posted the following on my Facebook wall:

I wrote it after spending a few days in Grand Rapids, Michigan with my sister Susan. They were possibly the most fulfilling days I’ve had on a trip back to Michigan since I moved to Colorado six years ago. In fact the entire three weeks I spent in Michigan this past May were the most fulfilling weeks I’ve spent in Michigan since I moved to Colorado.

It’s because I made the decision when I stepped off the plane in Grand Rapids to treat the trip as if I were somewhere brand new. To explore, relax and re-discover in that very familiar place.

Here’s what I found:

Grand Rapids’ East Town community, where Susan and her husband live, is as totally rad as all the hipsters who call that area home. Susan and I spent two days walking around the leafy tree-lined streets, stopping into shops like Art of the Table  where locals can pick up everything from peanut butter made in Grand Rapids to tabletop accessories to chocolate and artisan cheeses. They also carry a selection of local-made beers and wines. We shopped for Indian cooking spices and browsed their unique selection of cookbooks. I left wishing there was a shop like it around the corner from my own apartment in Vail.

We browsed through a couple of Susan’s favorite consignment clothing stores to see what gems we could find, and though our search yielded nothing that day, Susan assured me that’s not always the case.

One afternoon we grabbed a bottle of Layer Cake Cabernet and a wheel of brie for a snack from Martha’s Vineyard, East Town’s friendly neighborhood wine and spirits shop. Then we picked up a take-out sampler plate from GoJo’s, an Ethiopian restaurant, and feasted on spiced chicken and lentils, sopping up our watt (Ethiopian-style stew) with lots of injerra (a pancake-like flatbread). It’s a meal I’m still lusting over.

It was a thoroughly satisfying couple of days and, if nothing else, just nice to be out of the mountains and in a city for a moment (not that I’d trade my mountains for Grand Rapids, but it is enjoyable to crawl out of them every now and again and see what the rest of the country is seeing, eating and doing). I expressed my satisfaction to Susan and she shrugged off my compliments to her city, saying it seems quite small to her now, after living there for a couple years. I guess I can see her point (Although I’ve always been a small town girl and any place with more than two different coffee shops is a city to me), but, really, big city or not I was charmed by Grand Rapids on this trip.

I was also charmed by South Haven.

With its beaches and lakeside condos it’s easy to be charmed by my hometown. That is, if you didn’t grow up there.

It’s taken me a little more time than some (twenty-something years) to get here because I had to figure out how to separate the issues I have regarding my hometown, like hating high school and other issues relating to awkward teenage dramatics, from the charm of the town—I had to learn how to not hold those things against it. I worked especially hard on this during this last visit, and discovered a lot of cool stuff along the way. But scraping away high school angst is a tedious and time-consuming job, so that, my friends, is another story for another time.

Don't miss Holland

by Tracey Flower

A friend of a friend once shared this story:

A couple was in a plane on their way to Italy for their honeymoon. Due to some sort of random technical difficulties they were forced to land in The Netherlands, and for whatever reason, ended up stuck there for the duration of their trip (no I don’t know why they didn’t then just scrap the plane and hop on a train). They were less than thrilled with the situation and, while they spent their time sightseeing in Holland, they complained about everything and fretted over what they were missing in Italy. Thing is Holland isn’t so bad; in fact it’s pretty cool in its own right, but these guys were so worried about missing Italy that they didn’t get to soak any of it in. Catching on to the moral here? Don’t miss Holland, folks.

The South Pier Lighthouse, South Haven, MI

(From the Flower family photo archives)

I love to travel. I want to go everywhere and I want to see everything. So far my travels have only made a teeny tiny pine beetle-sized dent in that dream so I recently made a promise, no, scratch that, a commitment, to myself to simply travel more. To take and make every opportunity I can to go somewhere I’ve never been before, whether it’s Texas or somewhere slightly less foreign like, say, Morocco. (My apologies to the handful of Texans I know and love, I did have to go there).

This commitment won’t be difficult to stick to. I live in a place where it’s almost expected, if not encouraged, to take a month or so off each spring and fall (in seasonal job speak we call this the off-season). I’m not afraid of a little credit card debt and I love going on vacation. My head’s already spinning with all the options of where to go next. Hawaii? Italy? Costa Rica? Holland?

Ah, yes, Holland. Here we are again. And I’m not talking The Netherlands this time.

I’m currently on vacation in, wait for it, Michigan. Not exactly an exotic spring getaway. Not even somewhere I’ve never been before. This is where I’m from. It’s my (first) home and it’s where my family lives. This holiday was born out of a two-parted necessity, to catch up with friends and family I haven’t seen in a year and to celebrate the marriage of two dear friends. I’m thrilled to do both of these things. But, man, no offense to anyone (expect, maybe, the aforementioned Texans) but there are about a billion other places I’d rather have gone and spent my precious pennies (and, er, Capital One credit) this off-season.

Thing is Holland isn’t just a country in Europe. No siree. In fact it’s also a city in West Michigan. My grandparents live there. I was born there. And it comes complete with wooden shoes, windmills and a tulip festival.

And here I am smack dab in the middle of three weeks here. And, while I’m having a fabulous time catching up with friends and family (who I miss too much when I’m away and always leave wishing we lived closer) and that is probably enough to make this trip worthwhile, I also made a decision when I stepped off the plane at Gerald R. Ford International airport in Grand Rapids, Michigan to treat this trip, at least parts of it, as if I'm somewhere totally new; to explore, relax and re-discover this oh so familiar place. Those Pure Michigan commercials make this place look pretty damn inviting, right?

There are a billion amazing places to visit in this world. And I intend to make my way around the globe discovering them, even if every now and then I end up somewhere I’ve already been. Cities change. So do people. And because of that there’s always something new to discover. Even in Holland.


Stay tuned next time to read about what exactly I discovered, and re-discovered, on this trip.

Small Town Seasons: A Sonnet

For this post I decided to revisit some writing work from college. The following is a sonnet I wrote for a creative writing course that covered fiction, poetry, and playwriting. Poetry is not my strong suit and I don’t enjoy reading or writing it. The segment of that course that focused on poetry is the only training I’ve had in the subject. I fumbled through it and, in the end, my professor agreed that poetry isn't my forte. That said, I think any writer can benefit from studying poetry. Studying and writing poetry, sonnets in particular, for that course taught me an important lesson in structure and simplicity. If I remember correctly this was the only poem I wrote that received positive feedback from my professor and reading it not only reminds me of those lessons, it also makes me smile.


A crystal sea of fresh water stretches

endlessly. Rumbling waves tumble one

over another; their tongues making etches

in the cool compact grains on shore. The sun

majestically warms her subjects who flip from

back to front like pancakes on a griddle.

Then they will swarm these small town streets like bums.

They’ll eat. They’ll shop. They’ll drink. They’ll dance. Little

by little, though, they will disappear. Behind

them they will leave only scraps of summer;

grains of sand mingling with snow drops. Kind

signs that read “Closed for Winter.” A shrinking number

of subjects stroll the streets. An icy zephyr

roars off the water, moving things like feathers.

Day at the Beach

I often write letters to people in my journals, letters I’ll never send and the recipient will never read. I recently came across the following letter that I wrote to a friend during a trip back to Michigan after my first summer in Vail. I still remember this day and how I felt when I wrote this.

October 21, 2005

Today, inspired by your creativity and tales of days spent combing the sand for treasures, I spent some time on the beach. I felt drawn to it by the crisp breeze blowing across the lake, by the sound of waves lapping at the shore and the gulls’ distant squawks. I sat in the cool beige sand in a spot surrounded by long dune grass, which sheltered me a bit from the chilly breeze and allowed me to fully reap the benefits of the sun’s warm rays. I watched sea gulls swoop down and spiral up into an endless blue sky and I was jealous of them.

I reviewed the events of our vacation thus far and thought about the summer, I recalled the most defining moments, and realized how I’ve changed and how I’m continuing to change. I thought about us and about possibilities. I daydreamed about the future.

I went for a walk along the water after a nap in the sun. Zebra mussel shells crunched beneath my feet as I walked; there were thousands of them washed up along the water’s edge. I bent down and examined a cluster of them and marveled at how even a pest such as this one is beautiful. It made me think about how there are many things in this world that are both incredibly beautiful and horrible at the same time.

I found a stick on my walk, it was strong and smooth and all the rough edges had been whittled away by water and sand. Wavy lines in different shades of gray ran the length of the stick and its ends were rounded and dull. It seemed to carry with it a story, a journey that I couldn’t completely comprehend.

When I turned around and began making my way back up the beach I saw two women walking toward me, as they neared I noticed one was using a red-tipped white walking cane and was latched onto the arm of the other woman, using her as a guide. I observed them discreetly as they walked. They were talking quietly and seemed to be enjoying the same peaceful moment I was. I tried to imagine what it would be like to be blind on such a walk, to smell the fresh water breeze, to hear the children laughing in the distance and the waves next to you, to feel the soft sand under your feet, but not be able to see the grandness of the scene. I wondered if she had been without sight for her entire life or if it was something she had lost along the way. I closed my eyes for a moment as I walked but I could still see the vivid colors that surrounded me. I wanted to tell the woman, explain to her what it all looked like, how the sun, the sky and the trees around us looked like fall; the trees in their multi-colored grandeur, the sun at an angle that seemed to show everything in a new light, a light that reminds you of how rapidly everything around you is changing. I wondered if she feels lonely at times, even when she has a friend beside her, when all her other senses whisper to her the beauty of a day she cannot see. Goosebumps tickled my arms and a sadness moved through me at the thought of such a loneliness. I realized that a day such as this one could be so beautiful but carry with it such a heavy emotion and how, in a way, it was very much like those pesky zebra mussels.

I also realized, on the beach today, how precious days like this, moments like this, are. I felt like I had walked into an exquisite photograph for a few hours where only I existed. I believe the beach is a magical place, it’s the only place I’ve ever experienced these quiet moments of Zen and it is my deepest wish to carry this day with me for awhile.