A few years ago, I sensed the unreal smell of burned paper for the first time.
What I mean by unreal is that the smell did not exist outside of my mind. I just felt the smell acutely.
My initial response was visceral; I felt sure that my eyes would sting and coughing would follow, but no.
That's probably what annoyed me the most: the lack of reasonable reaction. I felt that I should have reacted but didn't. I nearly wanted to cough because that's what you do when you feel smoke, but no.
Today, I'm far more irritated by how the smell of burned paper deflects a lot of lovely scents, rather than being irritated by the smell itself.
By the way, the smell comes and goes, usually lasting for a few days at a time. Sometimes with some breaks in-between hours of the day when it's barely felt.
Some scents break through the madness, especially when cooking or sniffing the nape of my wife's neck.
A couple of years ago, when speaking with a colleague, he happened to mention this crazy thing that had happened to him. Long story short: he'd also been hit with this muck. I was flabbergasted.
Unlike myself, he'd visited a doctor about it. Doc had told him that smelling something that made you think you were in a burning building was not to be taken lightly: it could mean that you were about to have a stroke.
Well, no risk of that for me.
My colleague felt the issue come and go—if I recall correctly—for a year. Since then he's been healthy.
I've no idea if this will ever stop. I don't even know whether I will visit a doctor about it.
As I see my words about this forming, I become aware that if this happened to a friend, I'd worry and try to make them go to the doctor. As for myself, I really don't care beyond writing this about it.
I don't carry any grudge because of this and I'm now used to the smell.
It's absolutely silly of me, but I can sometimes wonder if there are others around me who experience the same sensation.
I can tell the difference between this and the real smell of paper burning in a heartbeat. This—what is happening in my head—feels real but isn't, and, when faced with the real smell of something that has actually burned, the difference is extreme.
At best, the illusory sensation masks odours. At worst, it masks beauty.
I recently ate strawberries. They tasted every bit of what they should: rich and sweet, I knew. They probably carried a fragrant scent, to sound like a perfumist. I've no way to know what they really smell like, at this point.
It's hard for me to know what I dislike the most about this; is it the fact that I'm prevented from experiencing beauty or the fact that I'm allowing myself to become pissed at this?
In this, an age where people are dying because of capitalism and stupidity, what I'm writing about now is piffles. I see solipsistic people everywhere and that's far more important to change than my mind playing this trick on me.
Posted from my blog with SteemPress : https://niklasblog.com/?p=25140
Originally posted here: https://hive.blog/health/@pivic/everythingsmellsofburnedpaper-r9grdbka8u
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