Let’s lighten things up a bit!

flying multicolored hot air balloon

I want to write about something serious and topical, but also, I don’t. Where’s the fun in that? I mean, a bunch of other more influential people are already talking about the things that need addressing—what will I add to the discussion? If I’m not meaningfully adding something with substance, then what’s the point?

Woah. Hold on a moment there, Matthew. Where did this all come from? You wanted to write a post about something light and fluffy because things seem so dire everywhere and you’re feeling crushed under the weight of depression, anxiety, and the crushing power of social influence and responsibility, remember?

Oh, yes. That’s right.

So, let’s do that thing then!

Seems weird to do it after that introduction, yanno?

Well…I suppose it’s weird to some degree. But we can still do it anyway? 🤷‍♀️

Okie dokie. Knock, knock.

Ugh, really?

Yes, really! Please, just say the thing.

Fiiine… Who’s there?

How should I know? I wasn’t there to answer the door; you tell me.

🤨

M3

The mysterious odour.

21812.15.7

I was at work one day as I often was at the time. Washing dishes, deep in thought. It was actually when I wrote these very words in my journal immediately after they popped into my head! I thought it was amazing. Now we’ll find out soon if it actually was. Or is.

So there I was; spray wand in one hand, dirty dish in the other. Which hand was which, I don’t recall—and as I said before, I wrote this all down the moment after it happened. Either way, it was probably right and left respectively.

But that’s not important. What’s important is that I was getting wet while washing dishes when I noticed a faint smell of… something. Something that I couldn’t categorize. It was like burning… gas, perhaps? No. More like rubber that had been out in the sunlight all day—like tires! But more like rubber tires that were made of hard-boiled eggs that have been left on the counter overnight.

I really couldn’t figure out the smell, and I couldn’t determine the source. I looked around and everything was normal. Seemingly normal.

So I did what I always do when I can’t figure out what caused something or there’s no apparent explanation; I blamed myself.

“Blamed” may not be quite the right word there, but… well, yeah. That’s accurate. Besides… I was used to my body emitting odd smells. And my body had been doing that a lot recently.

Again, “recently” was then when I wrote these very words and not now. Now my body doesn’t do that anymore. Now my body is fine. I’m fine. I’m normal. My smell is normal. I’m okay. At least… I hope that it is okay when I read this story to you—which is happening now and not then… but now. (Although, you might be reading this?)

So how could I know that I’m okay and normal and “odour neutral” now—in the future, which is now—the present—now, when I wrote this then and not now, when I’m actually saying this to you with my voice (maybe?) in the present? Well… best not think about that too much. Let’s just accept the fact that right now (the actual present, not then) I’m okay and everything—me—is/am normal.

So the smell… I assumed that came from me (that my body had emitted)…

**pause for dramatic effect**

Yanno, let’s talk about the word “emit”. That’s a really weird word, isn’t it?

~fin~