Saturday, January 22, 2011

Name that color and scent

Here's to a strange post -
if you had to give a color and scent to things, what would it be?

Examples for me -

Happiness would be yellow and the scent would be lilac. Someday I would love to have an area of lilacs with a table set inside just surrounded. To me, it is the most beautiful scent there is. I love vanilla but something about lilac tops it all.

Sad, I guess would be gray and smell like dirt?

what do you think?

What scents make you feel something? good? bad? reactions to colors?

ah yes, a tired mind at work, indulge me here :)

10 comments:

lizardmom said...

peace would be sky blue for me, the scent, hmmm. maybe dreamcicle? :)

Sassa said...

I often wondered how to describe a color to a blind person. For instance the color of an orange. Give them the orange, let them feel it and smell it and then describe the color. Interesting?

SER said...

to me it is the "moment". For instance if I'm hundry it could be the smell of a steak cooking on the grill, but then it may be the smell of a pizza shop....

OrbsCorbs said...

It depends upon your personal tastes, I guess. For me, happiness would be sky blue and the scent would be freshly cut grass, or dirt, which you associate with sadness. I love the smell of soil.

Sad would be black and smell like, um, that's hard. I'm not sure what sad would smell like. Something burnt, perhaps?

Peace would be white and smell like Lake Michigan on a spring morning.

Anger is red and smells like alcohol.

Love changes colors and scents.

Sex is light green and pale yellow and smells like freshly baked cookies.

Contentment is off white/cream and smells like my cat's fur.

War is dark violet and smells like gasoline, or maybe blood and feces, or maybe all three.

Sickness is vomit yellow and smells like it, too.

Pain is orange with the scent of rubbing alcohol.

Huck Finn said...

Excitement is the color of blue/orange and smells like nitro methane

Why Not? said...

I'm with Orbs, happiness would be dirt smelling. there is nothing better than the freshness of dirt of early spring. In high school I took care of the green house while my teacher was on Maternity leave and I would water all of the plants and just sit in there read a book and just relax and feel real peace breathing in the scents of fresh dirt and water. This was worth a credit in high school, something to be said about being responsible and not trying to grow pot constantly in the greenhouse. I like the yellow as the color of happiness as this is the color of the sun and that truly makes me happy.

Sad, color would be gray smell hard to explain but cold.. you know what I mean, a real cold day has a special smell.. that would be sad to me.
peace, white and smell of fresh linen hung out in the sun

anger a dark almost brownish red and smell of something burnt like burnt hair

bored like a pea green color and smell like something that has been closed in for too long kinda a musty dirty smell..

Sex , not sure what color.. can't picture anything but the smell would be sweat (oh my) I love the smell of sweat, another reason I like summer (am I strange?).

Love (romantic) a reddish and smell of shampoo?? (wow that was the first thing I thought of.. interesting)

Love (between me and the girls) yellowish orange and smell like fresh laundry (now it's just getting weird)

I think I'll cut it off there.. I'm coming up with stuff that is surprising me..

kkdither said...

I'm surprised at the comments by everyone. I've heard of this before; it has a name: Synesthesia. Here is a quote from an article I found on it:

Long dismissed as a product of overactive imaginations or a sign of mental illness, synesthesia has grudgingly come to be accepted by scientists in recent years as an actual phenomenon with a real neurological basis.

The article goes on to say:
irregular sprouting of new neural connections within the brain leads to a breakdown of the boundaries that normally exist between the senses.

Here is the url of the story.
http://www.livescience.com/health/050222_synesthesia.html

The whole idea is very interesting. For me.... nothing really relates to color; I do prefer some colors more than others? Smell, to me, however, can be very powerful. I'm very sensitive to smell. Ever since I was pregnant, some of the bad ones (Oakes landfill) can make me physically ill.

kkdither said...

My link is bad. Let's try it again.
http://www.livescience.com/health/050222_synesthesia.html

drewzepmeister said...

Strange...I can add a new dimension to this. The color in music. It may seem weird, sometimes I can "see" color in music. For example, Led Zeppelin's Physical Graffiti album is a brownish tan with a tinge of white to me, while their forth album is a shade of gray. The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's is like a rainbow, while R.E.M's Out of Time is yellow. Maybe it's because I'm biased on the album cover.. It know it's weird..

sylvia said...

angst is definitely white & smells like bananas.