10 best smells in the world

Recently, I visited my local, friendly Office Depot for toner. Why friendly? Because so many fresh-faced, young people ask me if I need help finding anything that I'm tempted to make a micro cassette recording of, "no, thank you" and punch play when they start stalking me with their good intentions.

Down the center of the store were the back to school specials, and the smell of Crayons washed over me, whisking me back to all the years I'd participated in the annual rite known as shopping for school supplies.

Of the five senses, smell is particularly interesting. I wrote a romance novel Say Yes in which the heroine was a perfumer by trade. I found the research fascinating. I'm sure all of you have smelled something and immediately remembered something linked to that smell. I can catch a whiff of Estee Lauder Youth Dew and my mom's face pops into my brain. That was her signature perfume when I was a kid.

Of all our senses, smell is the most primitive and is hard-wired into our brain which accounts for the smell-memory connection. Pheromones, those "invisible" smells account for probably 99% of love at first sight.

So here's my list of the 10 best smells in the world not in any particular order.

1. A freshly bathed baby
2. Crayola crayons
3. Johnson baby powder
4. New mown grass
5. Old-fashioned roses in the garden
6. My mom's homemade mayhaw jelly cooking on the stove
7. Chanel No. 5 (Love that old movie Seven Year Itch where Marilyn Monroe says: "That's their highest number.")
8. Clean clothes drying on a clothesline in the sun
9. Really old, single malt Scotch
10. Baking bread