I’m stalked by a smell. It’s lurking in my kitchen, in my bathroom, on my breath. It settles on the surface of my coffee and, sometimes, my skin. I can smell it in my perfume and all the food I eat. Most days I think it’s onion, but it’s also close to garlic, or gas, or garlic cooked on gas.
It is not, curiously, a scent I had smelled before October, and yet it’s there all the time, right under my nose. I caught Covid that month, and the smell has plagued me since.
“People used to think we only smell when we sniff, but that’s not true… We smell because we breathe.”
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It’s physiotherapy for the nose
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