Things i smell and what they remind me of

Car exaust

Got a big whiff of car exhaust and it reminded me of my family's trip to Paris during the winter break of 2008. City smells like this often take me to that trip, which is weird because I have lived in the city for 5 years and visited many other cities, and also it was a million years ago. Was that the first time I was in a big city? Why does the memory hold so strong?

Cigs

When I smell cigarettes I still sometimes think of a heavy metal festival my host brother took me to when I had just arrived in Germany. The memory is fragmented but I see yellow street lights outside of a bar, graffiti, a bathroom door. I remember what the stage looked like during the day but don't remember the music. Cigarettes at that time meant initiation into the secret and sexy life of adults. I was 15, below the drinking age even there, and I can't remember if my host brother let me drink anyway. I don't think I would have cared; just coming home together at 2am was a thrill.

Diesel

Diesel reminds me of my grandpop on his mule and boat. For the part of my life that overlapped with my grandpop, I knew him as a senile alcoholic who spent his days repeating the same 4 stories and watching fox news at damaging volumes. I don't fully understand how he went from a poor family in pennsauken to owning a big farm on the chesapeake. something to do with sheet metal manufacturing. I pulled up his obituary just now and learned that he came in second in a cross-berumuda sailing competition. At one time, he owned a small plane that he would take to south america to do god knows what. I don't know about any of that. When I smell diesel, it reminds me of almost running to the pond in his mule, and when he took my brother and me out to the bay late into his dementia and ran out of gas