The sense of smell is said to be the hair-trigger of memory. It is the most powerful memory activator we know. A smell can awaken even the innermost thoughts and feelings kept inside.
The scent of perfume or aroma of cooking that can awaken memories of a grandmother. The smoke of incense burning that leads one towards their enlightenment.
Or the smell of a flower.
I have many flowers growing in my garden, each with their own perfume. Each ready to infiltrate nostrils and activate lost memories of those that smell their scent.
The scent of a rose, given to a lover over a romantic dinner. The scent of jasmine, with its many memories of temples and ceremonies.
Every flower in my garden tells its own story. It is told in the flight of the bumblebee that smells it.
In my garden, I have a flower made of tin. It looks like the other flowers, shines brightly in the garden among the other colours of the rainbow. The bumblebees hover around this flower, wondering… Looking.
But they eventually move on. For this decorative flower has no scent.
In the garden of OSW, there are many flowers. Each gives off their own putrid scent. Greed, ego, evil intent. They all stink in their own way, and they all grow together.
The more we gather flowers in this garden, the more the stench rubs off on us. We find ourselves surrounded by greed, wallowing in the pollen of violence. But within the garden once grew a patch of rainbow coloured flowers.
They tried in vain to grow against the grain, spreading the perfume of life where the other flowers gave off the rotting stench of decay. But in the end, death found them. Starboy’s flower wilted. Vigour’s past caught up with him.
And you were exposed as the tin flower, weren’t you Generation Kid? Decorated from the moment you arrived in gold.
Growing among the other flowers but giving off no scent, with no human blood in its veins. Wondering what it was that made this flower different. Seeking answers to its own questions.
But this little tin flower learned a skill that no other flower in the garden possibly could. It learnt to sniff.
It learnt to smell.
When it did, it smelt the stench of that portal. What memories did that smell activate in your memory, tin flower? How deep does this proverbial rabbit hole go into your past?
You’re a tin flower that is trying to grow, Generation Kid. Desperate to turn over new leaves and smell the roses of life.
I am a gardener.
I bide my time, observing and tending to the garden. And when needs be, I prune.
From the biggest trees down to the smallest flowers, I prune. All the smells, the good, the bad and the ugly… I’ve seen them grow and clipped their branches.
Now it’s time to weed out the tin flower. Like I have so many times before, it is time to trim the garden.
I’m pruning you of that title.