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March 13, 2010

MICHELE M. BENDER | ‘Ambushed’ by early spring

By MICHELE M. BENDER The Tribune-Democrat Sat Mar 13, 2010, 11:24 PM EST

“I have good news,” I announced when galpal Judi dropped in last week.

“I caught myself rubbing my right eye!”

Judi looked puzzled.

“Allergens are in the air. There’s light at the end of the tunnel.

“Spring’s coming!”

“Come to think of it, my nose was running on one side,” Judi observed.

Signs are popping up everywhere.

“A skunk went off in our yard last week,” my friend Leanne complained.

For a moment, that statement created a fascinating visual of Bill Murray’s animal-shaped explosives in the movie “Caddyshack.”

But it also gave me hope. Nature is awakening.

My eyes and nose become mildly irritated, but I rarely sneeze. I think that’s because I have next-to-no sense of smell.

My mom was the same way.

When I was a preteen, we went to visit my aunt in the hospital.

Mom had doused herself, as usual, with her favorite fragrance, Tabu.

If I applied my perfume so I could smell it, people around me would have to be resuscitated.

While we were in the room celebrating Aunt Ethel’s recovery, another aunt arrived.

“Hi, Dorothy,” laughed Aunt Irma. “I knew you were here. I smelled Tabu in the elevator.”

For the next week, Mom kept asking, “Do you think I wear too much perfume?”

There’s no correct answer to that question when

the quizmaster is your mother.

You can’t explain that the perfume might be too intense when it leaves a vapor trail in, of all places, a hospital corridor.

My buddy Joe is what I call a “serial sneezer.” His sneezes come in fours and fives. He fired off four last week. More promise of buds and blooms.

I was a serial sneezer in junior high geography class when I sat behind a girl named Mary. Mary wore Ambush, a popular scent in the early ’60s. Ambush just lit me up. Our teacher finally, mercifully, changed my seat.

When I started dating in the mid ’60s, two popular men’s colognes turned my stomach as well. Guys thought they were wowing me with Hai Karate and Jade East.

They were wrong.

My friend Sharon says she never minded Old Spice aftershave because her dad wore it. When I encountered guys who used it, it seemed like the Old Spice ship always sailed in with a full catch.

Leanne added that, in addition to smelling the skunk aroma, she has been hearing songbirds. Judi reported her first robin sighting over the weekend.

Sights, sounds and smells of early spring.

My personal favorite is …DAYLIGHT SAVINGS TIME! Spring ahead!

My lilac bushes usually bloom around my birthday in May. If I get close to them, I can smell them, with no sneezes. That’s a good thing.

And skunks don’t wear Ambush. That’s a good thing, too.

Michele Mikesic Bender is a Johnstown resident and a member of The Tribune-Democrat’s Readership Advisory Committee.

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