Upon further reflection, how about one scent for every season?
Welcome to “The Salty Cod,” a monthly column in which humorist Steve Calechman grapples with uniquely New England dilemmas.
Illustration by Dale Stephanos
Dear Salty Cod: What should be Boston’s official smell?
There’s no shortage of classic whiffs: laundry, garlic sautéing in oil, gasoline, fresh tennis balls. But they don’t necessarily say, “This is us.” The challenge then becomes picking one that can represent everyone and everywhere in the city. Maybe it’s too big to even attempt.
Which is exactly why we should. We don’t just love to do hard things. We love to make things harder than they need to be, like walking on wet cobblestones in treadless shoes. But really, this quest needn’t be so stressful. Our list of official state things doesn’t always make sense or reflect popular opinion. The cranberry? Never anyone’s fruit choice for a pie or daiquiri. Boston terrier? A shelter could be giving the breed away with a free car, and people would still pay four figures for the latest doodle. Volleyball? Few have said, “It’s the only recreational sport I play.”
We’re a smart people, so we should be able to pick an official smell. If it had to be one, then chocolate chip cookies. Supposedly, Toll House cookies were invented about 20 miles south, and, well, what more do you need? But we’re such a big and awesome city, we can’t be contained by merely one scent. It’s only right that we have one for every season.
Spring: grilling. What’s being cooked is irrelevant—it’s the smell of the grill itself that means freedom, proof that the temperature finally cracked 35 and we finally get to be outside without layers. If we can play with fire while doing it, you bet we will.
Summer: boiled lobster. It’s “rich, salty, kind of sweet and musty, and definitely lobstery,” says Jody Adams, the iconic chef and cofounder of A Street Hospitality. If that testimonial weren’t so long, it would make a great license plate motto. Lobster in July is the ultimate. Except…wait for it…yeah, low tide. Now it’s the ultimate.
Fall: used couches. For some, spring is the season of new beginnings. For us, it’s autumn, with the returning students and their infectious, clueless energy. The smell is stale and damp, with a hint of urine. If you close your eyes, you’d think you were standing in Kenmore station.
Winter: waffle cones. We were once an ice cream powerhouse, and while the classic shoppes might be gone and new smells have taken over, our brains “don’t lose the old ones,” says Sandeep Robert Datta, professor of neurobiology at Harvard Medical School. And if there’s anything we do really well, it’s never forgetting our history, be it waiting 30 minutes in line for two scoops of mint chip or the jackhole who cut in front of us eight years ago.
But ice cream in February? Hell yeah. The sage Cliff Clavin said it best: “What else you gonna do with it?”
Got a question for the Salty Cod? Send it to [email protected].
