A privet space

In my brain exists a neural pathway, created at the instant I got a whiff of Texas privet. Since I was born in March, I would have been two months old. We had privet in the front yard, and its blossoms open in April and May. I imagine I was nestled in somebody's lap on the front porch when it happened. I wonder what I did. I would have hated mashed bananas by then; probably I took the scent of privet as something from the opposite pole of this strange new world, placed there by God as an apology for the banana. So I would have smiled.


I still smile. Every time. Same way. Here is something special about life. When I leaned to sniff these blossoms this morning, I was transported to a specific place in space and time, where it is morning in May, about 10 o'clock, 80 degrees, a hint of breeze. I go to that exact same space, every time. So far we have only two clusters, this and one other, that have bloomed, but the cluster on the left above will pop this week. They only bloom in late April and May, and the rest of the time it's a hedge. So these weeks are dear, and transporting.