What is more evocative than the heady smells of summer—a freshly mowed lawn, meats on the grill, fat little funnel cakes frying at the fair? For me, however, the smells of summer will be tied forever to the summers of my youth, and the pungent aromas of the Massachusetts Swimming Pool.
Chlorine, of course, was the overwhelming smell of 
our neighborhood pool, one of many public pools in the City of Buffalo visited daily by hundreds of kids. The life guards scooped in chlorine by the buckets full to neutralize the bodily fluids expelled both deliberately (e.g. spitting, to look cool) and involuntarily (well, let’s not go there). When the pool closed we would walk home in a bleary-eyed haze, smelling like clean laundry.
Hot tar, on the other hand, was the smell of recently patched potholes on Massachusetts Avenue and the parking lot outside the pool. Very few cars parked there (everyone walked to the pool), and when the tar got hot enough, it would stick to the bottom or your flip-flops, sucking them off your feet. Sometimes melted bubble gum would commingle with the tar, giving the bottom of your flip-flops a look and smell something like Good & Plenty candies.
Best of all, though, was the sensuous smell of baby oil, lavishly applied at the beginning of the summer so we could get a good “base tan.” Back in the day, before we knew the lasting damage we were doing to our skin, we were all in a hurry to get that tan started. Unlike people who live in sunnier climes, we knew we had a small window of opportunity. The theory went that we had to get a least one good sunburn before we would begin to tan, so we laid our towels on the concrete, slathered each other up with the Johnson’s, and baked until we were so red we could barely move.
Why did we do that? Well, you would have to grow up in a place known primarily for its long winters and mind-blowing amounts of snow to understand why having a great tan was a status symbol. If you were a teenager on the West Side with a café au lait tan, it meant one of several things: a) you were a life guard, b) you went to Florida during Easter vacation and started your tan there, or c) you were a full-blooded Sicilian born with a gorgeous base tan. Any one of these was enough to make the rest of us envious.
As a writer, I am always curious about what we remember and why. We know that smells trigger emotions and memories more strongly than any of our other senses. Psychologists say this connection is deeply rooted in the limbic system, designed, probably, to warn early humans of dangers (bad smells), and to trigger desires (good smells). So it only makes sense that when we write stories we want our readers to connect with, we tap into smells that will spark an emotional response, good or bad.
My three summer smells, while not necessarily pleasurable in and of themselves, instantly transport me to a memorable time in my life forever connected with youthful exuberance and budding sexuality. That’s why whenever I smell baby oil, I do not think of babies. I think of lobster-red teenagers, summer love, and the clear blue waters of the Massachusetts Swimming Pool.
How about you?
Wow Moxie, I grew up in West Virginia but your descriptive turn of phrase took me back to the same sort of summer smells! Being a pale Irish brunette, I never tanned but still always tried alongside all my blonde sisters. Good times!
Although I did not live on the west side, I did enjoy Shoshone. Yes I had similar experiences but we put iodine and mix it with baby oil to make sure we or at least I turned into a lobster. I’m very pale to this day but no longer use baby oil!
Now you use at least an SPF 30 product, am I right? How times have changed!
Moxie, Your words strike close to my heart and warm my memories. I, like you, lived at the Massachusetts pool all Summer long. I grew up on Arkansas Street and my Grandmother lived across the street on Hampshire. On the other side of my Grandmother’s fence was the pool so it was a short walk away or a climb over the very high fence. The thick smell of chlorine made me think of the cool waters so close by because in Buffalo they never really warmed. I have that Sicilian blood so I’ve never had a sunburn in my life and never knew my Winter color was envied until today. Thanks for the revelation after all of these years!
I am glad to have grown up when we did. It’s worth being this age now for the unique time we grew up. Now that I am in my 60’s I remind myself that the 60’s were amazing the first time around and they are proving to be equally amazing this time, too! Also, growing up in Buffalo was a treasure I am just realizing now more and more. Yes, we had Winters like no place else but we didn’t know how other people lived! Now, the world is so interconnected by the Internet that places all blend into one another like some odd new place I call Generica.
Buffalo was homogeneous even in it’s diversity. We were hardy, ate the best food anywhere and knew the City’s mood was set for the week ahead by the Buffalo Bills Sunday game. I am proud of my Heritage and of my Buffalo blood. I have traveld far and wide and lived many places but there is no place like Home
Cindi, how wonderful to hear from someone with similar fond memories of our beloved pool (and city). I take your point about the world being so interconnected that more and more places look and feel the same (same chain stores and restaurants, similar housing developments,etc). Like you, I think it is important for us to preserve, if only in our memories, what was unique about the Buffalo we grew up in. It is, after all, what made us who we are, no matter where we are now, and what we’ve become. Thank you so much for commenting.