it"s halloween shortly and this true story need another run out.
This morning in Warrington depot whilst walking round testing a new RF device I caught a smell that made me stop in my tracks. It rang so many bells in my distant memory cells that I was sure the depot would think it was a fire drill.
Our sense of smell is a funny thing and can trigger memories of situations or people, sometimes better than a picture. Sometimes the other way round, we see a picture and recall a smell.
A long time ago, when I was in my early twenties, I was driving home from work when an indistinct aroma permeated around the car. It wasn't unpleasant, but it was one of those smells that you could not imagine the source. It was fleeting and did not stay long enough for any sort of recognition.
I pulled up at Glesson's for the obligatory after work pint and then set off for home. The smell was no longer evident and was soon forgotten. I went into the shop and had got two yards when the ould lad barked that he wanted a word. I stopped and wheeled round and it was as if I had hit a wall of this smell as it seemed to envelop me, all my senses exploded. My arms looked like the exposed skin of a plucked turkey as the hairs rose and the skin rose with them. The ould lad's voice was like a whisper in the wind as I struggled to come to terms with the effect.
It went as soon as it came and I could again hear the ould lad.
“What's up with you, ya eejit” says he
“Nothing” says I shaking it off
“I need you to drive the flat bed to O'Connor's” says he
“Now” says I
“No, next week, of course now” says he.
Now that meant only one thing, a trip to pick up some empty coffins from the dreaded coffin maker, (although he did have a cracking daughter which made the trip worthwhile). It was an easy 10 mile round trip and shouldn't take more than an hour, including, loading and unloading.
“Do you smell anything funny” says I
“Why, did you fart” says he.
In that mood, I was going to get no sense from the ould lad so I left it and went into change.
I drove to O'Connor's and loaded the coffins. Now, newly hewn wood has its own smell and one that is pleasant, but as the last coffin was loaded, 'that' smell fleetingly returned. This was beginning to piss me off, but also beginning to unnerve me. I stayed for a while and chatted to Bernie O'Connor before setting off.
About halfway along the return trip in the twilight of the day the smell returned but this time stronger, not unlike the experience in the house. I drove on. The smell got stronger, more pungent and I opened the windows. This was to no avail. It was getting so bad, it had taken on mist proportions and I had difficulty seeing through streaming eyes. FFS I had to stop. I braked hard and pulled up just before Hurleys cross.
At that very moment an articulated lorry, belonging to the forestry, shot out of the Feakle road, missed me by inches and ploughed directly across where I would have been if I had carried on. It hit the fence on the other side and stopped with the trailer across the road.
I ran over to the cab and the driver was slumped over the wheel (We heard afterwards that he had suffered a heart attack and died at the wheel). As I pulled open the door of the cab 'that' smell drifted over me again.
What the smell was I do not know, had it any bearing on the nearness of my demise, again I do not know.
All I know is, for the first time since that day, I smelt that smell again.
