Guess That Smell!

I love fall. Always have. I love the way the changing colors on the trees, I love the crispness in the air, and as a once resident of a leafy suburb, I love smelling burning leaves and homes lit with fireplaces. The season might almost inspire me to write poetry if I didn't hate poetry so much. Especially the poetry in the New Yorker.

Now as a current resident of New York city, I experience fall in a slightly different manner than I did in my leaf-pile jumping youth. Since house plants are the trees of choice here, the leaves aren't so much "changing" as falling to the floor of my apartment with exaggerated, melodramatic cries of "you're killing me, Robin! Feed me! I need water! I need sunlight! I'm dyiiiiing!" Everyone's a critic.

Even the smell of fall here is slightly different. Sadly I don't know many people with fireplaces since my friends tend to be--how to say?--po'. And I'm sorry, but a boarded up fire pit that you light your Pottery Barn candelabra-cum-menorah in does not a fireplace make despite what your real estate broker told you.

So I'm left with the scent in the air to remind me that it is, indeed, my favorite season, and thankfully, New York City comes through for me! I'm not referring to the muted whiff of garbage, I'm not talking about the smell of the beery tailgater stumbling out of The Corner Bistro post-game, I'm talking about the smell that fills my apartment every morning come mid-September.

I happen to be one of those lucky NYers who lives directly above a restaurant. Some would say this isn't particularly lucky at all what with the increased potential for vermin, rodents and the hooligans hanging out on my stoop (hello, boys!). But it turns out that my restaurant must make a killer breakfast because each morning I'm roused to the scent of buttered bread baking, eggs frying and arteries clogging. I'm not sure why the scent is strongest in the fall, it just is. And lest you think that this blog post is just a gratuitous ad for the restaurant beneath my feet, I assure you it's not because like any good New Yorker, I wouldn't consider going in there and meeting my neighbors.

So for now, I'm just happy to enjoy the smell and if you happen to see a beautiful young lass jumping into a pile of garbage quite literally trying to return to her salad days, give me a wave.