What's in a smell?

What's in a smell?  Well I say it can be your muse.  If you think about it, imagine walking into a kitchen filled with the smell of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies.  It may take you back to a time when you were a child in the care of a loving mother ready to hug you when you came home from school. Your sense of smell can be a powerful thing. Smells can take you back in time, can make you feel warm and cozy, can arouse you, or can repulse you, but all can give you inspiration in one way or the other.  When I'm trying to write a sensual scene I sometimes will get my husbands cologne and close my eyes and breathe in the musky scent.  Smells can make your body tingle.  Close your eyes and breathe in.  What do you smell?  A lot of the time, smells are overlooked and discarded.  But, I say, use what you can. The smell of rain can stimulate an array of possible writing material.  Write down how you are feeling with the smell.  Does it make your heart race? Some of the best chapters you have ever written may have come from a single smell.  So use this sense to your advantage when you have hit a road block.  Go outside, go to the laundry room, the kitchen, anywhere different aromas may linger in the air. Simply walking into a hospital or an elementary school will send your senses in a frenzy giving you many ideas.  Just make sure you have your pad with you to write down things you are imagining or feeling. Things that are touching your soul. So, what's in a smell?  Maybe a bestseller. Use every advantage you can to find you muse. Have a great day and smell the world around you. :)