Doesn't smell like mine

Got back from our holiday to Ireland on Sunday evening. All of the family were looking forward to getting back home as we had had an extended journey with 'essential engineering works' causing delays to trains, and also meaning we would be doing a large part of the journey on a smelly bus on our way back from the airport.

Although the bus smell was awful, that is not the smell I'm talking about in this post. It was the smell of the house! You may not be like me, but, if I've been away there is something reassuring and familiar about the smell of your own home. You walk in through the door and the smell as much as anything tells you that you are home.

The thing was the house didn't smell like mine. It smelt odd. Not nasty, just odd. It had a sort of mango-ey tropical niff, not a scent that I associate with our home. Over the years I've come to appreciate the sense of smell. I always check fruit out for ripeness by sniffing it. Then there was the big one, 'baby whiff'. This is the smell of your baby that has an almost hypnotic reaction in a parent. The smell seems to come from the back of the head and confirms what the eyes can see, that yes this child is mine. It can make you feel everything is ok, even when you are tired and worn out. I guess in the animal world this happens all the time, and is more important than physical features.

Back to my house. Do I know why the smell was ...wrong? Yes I do. Although it wasn't MY smell I did recognise the smell. It smelt like my mother-in-laws house before she moved into ours. I'm not going to complain about it, but my job now is to ensure our niff is the most prominent one again. So I have primed the wife and kids to rub our scent on everything like house cats. I have said no spraying your scent like cats do, but it is ok to leave the bathroom door open until I feel the balance has stacked back in our favor.