From a search using Google: Scientists believe that smell and memory are so closely linked because the anatomy of the brain allows olfactory (sense of smell)  signals to get to the limbic (the structural area of the brain concerned with emotion and motivation) system very quickly. Experts say the memories associated with smells tend to be older and thought about less often, meaning the recollection is very vivid when it happens. I believe this to be true!

This is the time of year that I will make a trip or two to my favorite greenhouse to purchase flowering and vegetable plants. Walking through the numerous aisles of all the varieties available for beautifying our yard is always a “walk down memory lane” for me, a lane I first discovered in the early years of my childhood when we visited my dad’s parents. Grandpa and Grandpa Jewell’s last home was about a forty minute drive from us. It was situated on several acres that allowed them to have chickens, huge berry patches of every variety, some corn, grapes, and wide open space to explore or climb trees. Our weekly Sunday visits with them were never boring. Sometimes there was a litter of new kittens, too, much to Gramp’s dismay.

While all of those things were great fun for a little girl growing up in the city on a corner lot, there is a memory from being with grandma that I hope never leaves me and that’s the smell of her small greenhouse which was attached to the rear of their small home.

My grandmother loved flowers, especially pansies and petunias. She had several potting benches to work her hands in the dirt when it came time to plant seeds. I knew all the stories of her “green thumb” which had to be diligent when raising 11 children, especially during the hard years the Depression era ushered in to so many families. I’d heard how her vegetable garden was a “legend” in the minds of envious neighbors who asked, “Sadie!–how do you grow such beautiful vegetables”…her gentle response “Oh, just a little manure now and then along with good watering”. Those in our family knew it was most likely “divine” care she was provided, because the truth is as grandma walked among her young garden plants she constantly was in prayer asking the Lord to provide for her hungry family.

In her last years at the Otter Lake home, she still planted a small garden, added in growing those pansies and petunias which she sold to anyone passing by–never on Sunday though!–that was the Lord’s day and money was never to be exchanged on His day. Folks were welcome in her greenhouse, dirt floors and all. She was happy to chat with prospective visitors or even pray with someone who would join her for a divine appointment. Family folklore talks about a time the local catholic parish priest came to buy flowers and since he had on his clerical collar gramma struck up a conversation that centered on Jesus–her first love! I don’t know what topic they landed on but it was clear they had a slight disagreement and gramma’s calm gentle manner to “resolve” the question was “I think we should get down on our knees right here (on the black dirt floor in the greenhouse) and pray about it”. That priest wasn’t comfortable joining her in prayer which gave her some dismay and disappointment. After all, in her mind, if two people professed loving Jesus, why couldn’t they pray together regardless of position or denomination? We were told that with all the confidence and gentleness this gracious woman could muster she asked him to leave “because anyone who can’t pray…..”

I could write volumes about my Grandma Jewell and I’m certain that will happen. I don’t want to forget her, having had her in my life for 14 years before her death. One way I am assured of not losing my memories of  her is every spring when I walk into ANY greenhouse…the smell of dirt hitting my nostrils…the warm humid air trapped inside the walls…flowers in bloom of all colors and varieties…and the joy I feel when I arrive at the benches holding pansies and petunias.