Summer in the City

I’ve never really given much thought to smells of summer.

Still, the prompt implores me to think of some. By the way, I don’t have one set smell. It’s more the bits and pieces that make up a summer’s day or even just summer as a whole.

So here’s a few of the ones I think of most: a warm ocean breeze, salty and punctuated by the shouts of kids and cars driving past with open windows. The smell of sunscreen, faintly medical-smelling and not something I’ve ever associated with coconut, and with it the occasional bug repellent that does no-one’s olfactory senses any favours. Fish and chips in their newspaper parcels, the scent of which is present mostly in the confines of the car and no less delicious for being slightly less hot.

Smog and bus fumes made worse for the heat; I live in a relatively big city and we have a lot of buses. A friend-shape once observed the smog is why we don’t see so many stars at night. I think of this when I’m at a bus stop or walking along a street, and so I guess smog is what resentment smells like. 

Ice-cream in all its incarnations, or gelato in its fruitier, stronger-smelling glory. Gelato vs ice cream: the ice cream does not compare. Chocolate in particular, though I’m partial to lemon gelato. The flavour – and thus scent – are more pure and concentrated. The dairies on the beaches, serving ice cream or fish and chips in the same day and creating a hybrid smell. 

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