I have known it to be true that certain smells can bring me back in time to memories of distinct instances or locations. I believe this is also true for the sense of taste.
For my birthday last year my brother and sister bought me fresh tea. One of the flavors in a package of many was lemon-grass. As I was drinking my tea tonight I remembered that the last time I had lemon-grass tea was while serving in the Peace Corps in Honduras with Shawn. One sip of my tea this evening and I was brought back to our little cement room house, sipping tea on a cool Honduran night with a low temperature of 75 degrees. I could picture the single gas-counter-top-burner we used to heat the water; almost as if we were performing a science experiment. I could see the long, smooth lemon grass stalks in their natural state squished into our teapot to soak up the zesty flavor.
Shawn loved to make this tea at night to accompany his work on the computer writing journal entries or notes back home. The hot drink had a clean aroma, filling our house with its scent and calming our stresses. The tea was always given to us as a gift from a local farmer, freshly cut from his field and shared with us to enjoy. Now I am able to recollect how good it tastes to drink a gift.
One sip of my tea tonight and I can see him. I never knew taste was related to sight. Now it is all connecting in my mind. I taste and see and smell the tea and it brings me directly back to Shawn. The memory is smooth and clean and calming.
