Upon our traveling to the Renaissance Festival back in the wee beginning of October (remember that Weekly column?!), my suite-mate and I purchased a bar of handmade soap. After smearing our noses in the dozens of samples in the town-market-esque shoppe and chatting with the saleswoman (soap wench?) who had “free soap here” written on her chest with arrows pointing toward her cleavage, we decided on a oatmeal-colored soap called “Satyr.”

Now, many of you classicists out there will know much more about the connotation of “satyr” than I do, but a recent visit to Wikipedia informs me that satyrs refer to the male companions of Pan and Dionysus who played pipes and frolicked through woods and mountains. (Sounds like my definition of a good time!) But according to the soap wench, satyr is also a fragrance used by the Greeks as an aphrodisiac. Sexy, no? We didn’t know what the soap wench’s judgments were concerning two young ladies buying a sexy soap, but we figured she had probably seen odder people lingering around her shoppe.

I will now describe to you, lovely readers, what joy this bar of soap that rests on our bathroom countertop has given me. (Yes, I’m writing about the joys of soap. It’s just one of those weeks.)

When I come back to my suite after a dreadful day of classes, or open my bedroom door in the morning after a night of horrible dreams, I am welcomed by the warm, earthy smell of our satyr soap. I wish The Weekly had a scratch-n-sniff for you all to smell this wonderful scent. It is indeed like a forest, except there’s some chocolate in there too. Or maybe almond. It smells like a man, in a forest, eating chocolate-covered almonds. He’s in one of those white peasant top things and brown suede pants. He drops one of the chocolate-covered almonds. It falls from his rough man-hands into the soil and you see him bend over, ever so slowly, revealing his firm backside…

Woah. My apologies. I seem to have gotten off the topic.

What I’m trying to allude to here as I daydream about my sexy forest man is the power of scent. Scents can change our moods, alert us to things, relax us. Just as the satyr soap comforts me after a difficult day (hmm, kinda sounds like a boyfriend), other scents like coffee or citrus make me feel more awake. Some scents, like wet dog and lake water, make me think of home, as much as they are also often quite stinky. Others make me want to vomit, such as moldy Gustieware found in some hidden corner or literally the vomit on the sidewalk in front of Southwest Hall. I ignore these truly nasty smells, mostly because they are a result of others’ poor choices (let’s hear it for returning your Gustieware and drinking responsibly!).

As much as our lives are about seeing and hearing what’s around us, we must also take into account sense of smell as an important and enjoyable perception. How often do we describe what we see or hear in the day, when smell, too, is a way we interpret the world? Let us not focus on the ever-pervasive poop smell on campus, but the more pleasant ones like old library books, smelly markers and Mr. Snuggle fabric softener.

And of course, the sexy satyr soap.