The End of My Nose

This is a Sunday Story.  There are no politics today (whew!!), just a story about, of all things, smells.

Covid

It was the middle of track season in 2022.  We all “adapted” to Covid, now a part of our lives.  It’s still out there, by the way.  About 47,000 Americans died with Covid as a “factor” in 2024, the last year there’s good data (NPR).  And of course, there’s the whole “politics” of Covid.  It’s been stricken from our collective memory, as well as official reports.  So it’s tough to be sure how “Covid free” we really are, or were, or will be.

But this essay isn’t about the politics of disease.  It’s about a known side-effect of Covid, long term consequences of having the disease, called “long Covid”.  And on April 11, 2022, I wrote an essay (What’s Missing) about my experience with it.  I lost my sense of smell. 

There’s a Forrest Gump riff about it:  I couldn’t smell “shit”.  Really, we had five dogs at the time, and my job was to pick-up the backyard.  And, I couldn’t “smell the coffee” either.   I’m a “smoker” guy, I enjoy smoking ribs and turkeys and hams and all sorts of other things.  I could stick my head in the actual smoker, filled with hickory smoke.  I could sense the “burn”, but I couldn’t smell hickory.  

Gone Missing

More importantly, I couldn’t smell the gas if the stove was left on, or burnt toast, or whether it was a clean or dirty t-shirt, or whether there was a radiator leak in my twenty year-old Jeep.  My sense of smell just disappeared.

I could still taste, but there’s a huge difference between a perfectly done ribeye when you can smell it, and when you can only taste it.  I found myself moving to more spices; hot sauces and peppers.  No smell, but I definitely could taste them.

And that’s the “way it was”, with one exception.  In September of 2022, I did something really stupid, and flipped a lawn tractor over on top of myself (see Stupid Human Tricks).  That required a “rebuild” job on my shoulder.  And what I found was, after a couple of hours under general anesthesia, all of a sudden I could smell again.  It came back in a rush, and lasted for a couple of weeks.  Then, almost as quickly as it arrived, it was gone.  Two weeks of one-handed “smelling the coffee”, then it was “blank slate” again.

Frustration

And that’s how it was for the past three years.  It was a note in my medical chart – “Long Covid, loss of smell”.  And while there were theories about how to get it back:  “Put your nose in a coffee bag, inhale deeply, remember what coffee used to smell like”, they didn’t work for me.

One of the most frustrating experiences was going to the “candle shop”.  There were all the jars with exotic names:  Grandma’s Christmas, Summer Grass, Grandad’s Pipe, Cinnamon Spice.  Open the jar, stick my nose in and…nothing.  It could have said Marty’s Old Running Shoes, it didn’t matter.  Going there was a frustrating experience, both for me, and for Jenn, who wanted my opinion.

It’s Back!!

Medically it’s been an annoying fall.  Without going into detail, getting old sucks.  It’s required lots of very personal medical procedures (nothing too serious).  Suffice is to say, that I was under general anesthesia twice in the past six months, with one more to go.  None of it is “fun”, and here I am, a couple of months after the second surgery.

But there is one upside.  I can smell:  the coffee in the morning, the burnt toast in the toaster, even the ribeye cooking on the grill.  (The advantage of winter:  the poop is frozen in the back yard and doesn’t smell!!).   And so far, for the last couple of weeks, it seems to be getting better (stronger?).  

When I was a little kid, my eyes got progressively more near-sighted.  I didn’t realize it, until the “grade-level” eye tests.  We stood in the cafeteria pick-up line, where we got our milk cartons at Southdale Elementary in Kettering, Ohio. At the other end by the “check-out”, there was an eye chart posted on the wall.  I distinctly remember being told, “move up until you can read the top line”.  I was already past the main course to the vegetable area, when I called out “E”.  That’s when I realized all the other kids could read what was on the chalkboard, without going up at the end of class.

My sense of smell “snuck up” in the same way.  And even when I realized I was “smelling”, I didn’t put much faith in it.  I’ve been fooled before.  But right now, today, I am smelling stuff.  And I hope it lasts.

I even put my nose in the cinnamon candle jar this morning.  Christmas was right there, three weeks late.  It was right at the end of my nose. 

The Sunday Story Series

2021

• Riding the Dog  – 1/24/21
• Hiking with Jack – 1/31/21
• A Track Story – 2/7/21
• Ritual – 2/14/21
• Voyageur – 2/19/21
• A Dog Story – 2/25/21
• A Watkins Legend – 3/7/21
• Ghosts at Gettysburg – 3/14/21
• Lessons from the State Meet – 3/28/21
• More Lessons from the State – 4/4/21
• Stories from the Road – 4/11/21
• A Bear Wants You – 5/1/21
• My Teachers – 5/9/21
• Old Friends  – 5/23/21
• The Gift – 6/6/21
• Echoes of Mom – 6/20/21
• Stories of the Fourth – 7/3/21
• Running Memories – 7/25/21
• Lost Dog of Eldora – 8/1/21
• Dogs and Medals – 8/8/21
• The New Guy – 9/5/21
• Stories of 9-11 – 9/12/21
• The Interview – 9/26/21
• Night Moves – 10/3/21
• Funeral for a Friend – 10/11/21
• National Security – 10/24/21
• Boots on the Trail – 10/31/21
• Taking Care of Mom and Dad – 11/14./21
• Dogs Found and Lost – 11/21/21
• Watching Brian 12/12/21
• Stories from Shiloh – 12/19/21
• Team Trips – 12/26/21

2022

• Uphill, Both Ways  – 1/9/22
• Old Trophies – 1/30/22
• The Last Time – 2/7/22
• Olympic Miracles – 2/13/22
• Mind Numbing – 2/20/22
• Track Weather – 4/3/22
• What’s Missing – 4/11/22
• A Scouting Story – 4/17/22
• Waterproof Paper – 5/8/22
• Origin Stories – 5/22/22
• Origin Stories – Part Two 5/29/22
• Back at State – 6/5/22
• Out in the Country – 6/19/22
• Pataskala Downs – 7/4/22
• Car Stories I – 7/24/22
• Car Stories II  – 7/31/22
• Old Man Experience – 8/7/22
• Cross Country Camp – 8/14/22
• New to the Pack – 8/21/22
• Car Stories III – The Bus – 8/28/22
• A Day in the Life – 9/4/22
• Stupid Human Tricks – 9/18/22

2023

• Fair or Foul – 2/26/23
• Immigrant Story – 3/12/23
• Busy Season – 5/15/23
• Of Jeeps and Bucks – 5/28/23
• A Pole Vault Story  -6/11/23
• End of an Era – 6/25/23
• Paybacks – 7/2/23
• Graying in Pataskala – 7/17/23
• Being a Goat – 7/23/23
• Toy Truck – 8/20/23
• Medical Terms – 8/27/23
• Missing Margaritaville – 9/3/23
• The McGowan – 9/10/23
• Who’s Watching – 10/22/23
• The Saturday Before – 10/29/23
• A Tale of Turkey, and Dogs – 11/26/23
• Bruno’s Story – 12/3/23
• Out in the Country – 12/10/23
• Christmas Eve – 12/24/23

2024

• Rube Goldberg – 1/12/24
• Our Pataskala Kroger’s – 2/5/24
• A Sad, Sad, Dog – 2/11/24
• Singing in the Tornado – 3/3/24
• Your Safe Spot – 3/17/24
• Easter Dawn – 3/31/24
• Swarms – 4/14/24
• Lowest Common Denominator – 4/28/24
• Seniors – 5/12/24
• Season’s Over – 6/22/24
• Camp Morning – 6/30/24
• Jeeping – 7/7/24
• How Mondo Won the Gold and Started a Dog Fight (almost) – 8/6/24
• Fifty Years of the McGowan – 9/8/24
• A Walk in the Woods – 10/22/24
• Smokin – 12/6/24
• Coal for Christmas 12/16/24
• Provenance – 12/22/24

2025

• Lost and Found – 2/22/25
• Catching Cars – 3/2/25
• PV Mentor – 3/31/25
• Dogs, Jeeps, Fireworks and Beer Coolers 7/6/25
• It’s About Time – 7/27-25
• Gas War – 11/30/35

2026

• The End of My Nose – 1/18/26