The Scent of Trees

This morning, on the way to school, I was singing in my car - as I do, loudly - when I drove through the orange groves on either side of the road. The scent of springtime orange blossoms is enough for you to stop your car in the street, but all I did was stop mid-verse to breathe in. Later, on the way home, passing the trees again, the stirred-up atmosphere made for more fleeting fragrance - far less intense than the heavy velvet of scent hanging in the still and dark air. But just enough of a flirtation to remind you of its presence. However long it lasts each year.

I am reasonably certain heaven must smell like an orange grove in blossom on a warm spring evening.

Or else like a eucalyptus grove.

The scent of central-coast eucalyptus was even more pervasive, in that it is fragrant year-round, not just for a season. Always present. The cool, humid air forever thick with it. It reminds you where you are. It reminds you of where you used to be.