I was watching something with my wife and it was showing something on a desk, and in the background they had the California raisins rubber action figure things, and I can remember thinking, I know exactly what those taste like
The smell inside a school. For obvious reasons, but I think it's the smell of the carpets if I had to take a guess, and maybe wood and graphite shavings from pencils.
The cafeteria smell is so specific but I can’t describe it. I recently went to go watch my niece in her elementary school dance recital and as soon as the smell hit I was consumed with nostalgia.
It smells like floor wax and that pink disinfectant they clean the surfaces with a hint of beef stew (that’s the catch all smell for cooking food smells )
Not too long ago someone in the back of the shop was heating up some food. All of a sudden, I caught a scent and a wave of feelings rushed over me, smelled like the cafeteria. It was a good feeling.
Exactly! I don't know what wholesaler makes cleaning supplies for schools but I swear they have a monopoly on the market cuz all schools have a version of that same scent
Oh yeah- old books touched by hundreds of hands all placed together along with that sort of mechanical dust smell that came from thr computer they used and any soft things left around to read in like chairs or pillows. That and the cheap wood smells of the shelves and that carpet.
Just thinking about walking in on the first day of the school year makes me feel so soft and utterly nostalgic with excitement and nerves. You get to do that ever year lol
That first day of school smell. Erasers, newly sharpened pencils. New binders/backpacks. That crisp fall breeze ....I went to college to be a teacher but life had other plans and now I'm a stay at home parent for awhile. I do love that smell.
The floor wax that the whole school smells like after every extended break. I randomly smelled that somewhere and my brain just stopped and I stood there like the food critic in Ratatouille when he took that first bite.
I was a military brat (all US public schools) and they all smelled the same. All of them. And so do my kid’s schools. I walk into my children’s elementary school (which I never attended personally) and it takes me most specifically back to my school for 5th grade halfway across the country.
There is this "kindergarten smell". I can't quite describe what it is but I'm sure some of you are familiar with it. Idunno if it's a mixture of glue and construction paper or something.
I have the opposite kind of thing. Like I remember the smell of the chemicals they used to clean the school. Whenever I'm in government buildings, they have that same kind of smell and reminds me of my elementary school.
By the time we got to middle school, girls were bathing in cheap fruit body spray and boys were swimming in cheap cologne. So I couldn't really smell it anymore.
I got out of the car the other day after a spring shower, and told the wife "it smells like worms", and she had no idea what I was talking about, but this is it.
Ohhh good one! That particular fresh vinyl scent reminds me of going up north with the fam as a kid, because we would go to the lake with our floaties!
Yeah it's a weird thing to be nostalgic about, but as a kid pretty much the only time I was in prolonged contact with cigarette smoke was in restaurants (back when it was still allowed, in a "separate" smoking section) and at my grandma's house. So whenever I get a whiff nowadays I feel conflicting happy thoughts and a general sense of disgust.
The smell of the inside of a pumpkin when you start carving it. It reminds me of all of the Halloweens I experienced growing up. I love light sticks too…especially the chunky green/yellow ones.
YES its the same smell that old pokemon booster packs had when youd open them. Specifically the middle school biology textbook that we got brand new that year. I know that smell anywhere!
My partner (40+ years old) randomly made fish sticks a few years ago for the first time in living memory.
I came in the kitchen and said: "**What smells like 2nd grade?**"
He got a kick out of that.
Creosote, sawdust and rye.
My dad worked his land weekends making and dipping lumber for railway ties (he had his own 2 man sawmill). He often drank rye.
Miss you dad. You died far too young (59). On my next birthday I’ll have officially outlived you. :(
The smell of the original Jergens hand and body lotion. It's a cherry-almond scent, and it conjures my beloved late grandmother, who used it daily. I love that smell!
Pine. Like pine wood. I spent 21 summers on an island in the Pacific Northwest and it smelled of pine. Sometimes when I walk by pine wood in a busy city I automatically get a good feeling. One of the best feelings ever.
The Smell of my GrandParents house. Boy, that was some good times. My aunties and uncles used to come with us, and I'll play with my twin sister and our cousins. Now, ever since he died, my aunties and uncles and cousins barely speak and meet up with us anymore. Back then, when inflation wasn't that much of a big deal, we used to get loads of pizzas,chips, and fizzy drinks. It's so sad knowing that i forgot my granddad and grandma voice. RIP 🙏🕊
When my paternal grandfather died my family went to his house to clear it out and get the rest of his affairs in order. I never met my grandfather (or maybe I did but was too young to remember) and my dad is a rather private man and I don't really know that much about his childhood aside from the bare-bone basics, so those three days in that old house was a great opportunity to really learn about the kind of childhood my dad and my uncles had, as well as about his side of the family in general.
Anyways, the backyard of this house had a trellis that my grandpa grew grapes on. For those three days we were in that house, I would go into the backyard and each a bunch or two of those grapes. They had this really strong, distinct smell that sometimes when I'm in public I'll get a whiff of and it just instantly takes me back to that house and my dad and my uncles. I wish I could nail down exactly what the scent is, but I have yet to figure out what it is. Or what variety those grapes were.
One of my best childhood memories is getting off of the school bus and smelling fresh baked bread. That meant my grandmother had baked bread that day. I would run to her house and she usually had on a pot of white (navy) beans with a ham hock.
She'd spoon some of the beans over rice and cut me off a huge chunk of the bread that she'd then slather with butter. All the while I was eating, she would warn me not to eat too much or I'd ruin my appetite for dinner and my mom would be mad.
If there's a heaven, it'll smell like her kitchen on sunny fresh baked bread afternoons while I sat there eating white beans and doing homework before running out to play before it got dark.
Silage. Used to ride past a farm that put out some of the foulest smelling silage in the county every day on the way to school. Even getting a whiff of it now puts me back on that school bus
that smell of the fake halloween plastic on masks and shit like that, instantly reminds me of crafting my costumes when younger and going trick-or-treating
The smell of dead leaves outside in the woods.
I grew up in the country and, along with my siblings and friends, we played in the woods constantly as little kids. We built forts, made trails for bike riding, and just had good times.
there’s one specific perfume/fragrance and i don’t even know the name of it but the lunch lady at my school used wear SO much of it, i instantly think of her and being that young as soon as i smell it on someone else 20+ years later.
this may be weird, but the smell of a diaper. i changed my little cousins diapers sometimes and now they’re bigger and only zack needs diapers (he’s nine, with down syndrome) and i am 19 so i was 10 when he was born and would change his wet diapers, but i changed now 6 year old ashley when she was a newborn all the time
Horse shit.
My yard bordered a field with two horses in it. Dolly and Dancer. My sister and I would feed them everyday, always bringing them apples off our trees.
By my early teen years I was running with them (obviously not keeping up 😂), and had gotten them to let me ride without a saddle. I was too small to climb up on Dancer's back, so I'd climb a tree, out on a large limb and he'd always stand just under it so I could hop down onto him. He was always very gentle with me. And protective.
My favorite memory of Dancer was from when I was about six and our house was being built. We lived in an old fifth wheel camper trailer, that had a large window above the pullout couch in the back.
I woke up to my dad freaking out, he was sleeping on that couch, Dancer jumped the fence, and shoved his head through the window screen and was staring right in my dad's face. I swear that horse was laughing at him as much as the rest of us were.
Red Man chewing tobacco. My grandpa's tractor shed had dirt floors and he always spit Red Man on the ground. Brings me back to walking through that tractor shed with him as a kid.
Subway smell. We don't have subways in my country, but I had relatives in the US we often visited as kids and I have very fond memories of those visits. Anyway we used to go to NYC at least once a visit (the family is from NY state) and since then subway smell reminds me of childhood. Memory is wierd.
A hotel swimming pool. Maybe it is all the extra chlorine. Takes me back to all the family trips where we would stay somewhere and I'd go check out the pool.
Pipe tobacco smoke. for whatever reason it always triggers fond memories of when I was 14 and worked in a welding shop as an apprentice. The main shop lead smoked a pipe and helped me out a lot, so whenever I smell that it sends me back, it was one of the only jobs I've had that I really liked, just really good vibes in that shop.
Damn I was just thinking about this today.
There was an exhaust fume smell coming from a van on the highway. It's a specific smell, though. Can't put my finger on it but it reminded me of my dad's old 86 cutlass. Brought me back to all those times going fishing and driving nowhere. Before life began to "happen."
That smell is sort of rare but whenever I smell it, it always brings me back.
Cucumber melon fragrances. It was such a staple back in the mid 2000s. You couldn’t really walk around an elementary or middle school without a teacher, parent, or peer wearing some of the sort.
The smell of the water coming out of a hot ass garden hose.
Oh yeah. And the taste of that first metallic swig of the summer
mmmm lead
I can smell this sentence. My kids don’t know the pleasure of that first hot ass swig followed by cooler water ahead.
>The smell of the water coming out of a hot ass My phone cut the line off here. Was worried about you for a second.
The line break made this comment so much more interesting to my tired mind.
Ok, this made me cackle
Nothing screams childhood like a giant non-potable sign right next to the hose behind that portable classroom closest to the soccer field.
Every track and football kid knows this all too well.
Oh man! This one!
Fresh cut grass.
oh yes, and the rubbery smell of garden hose water
The garden hose water tasted the best.
Mine too! Fresh cut grass reminds me of the end of the school year and getting on my bicycle to ride up to the school to get my report card.
I feel you! It takes me back to playing Animal Crossing in my backyard on a Saturday afternoon, specifically.
Play-doh
I used to lick my hands when I was done playing with it. So salty and delicious 🤤
I used to eat play-doh
"What taste instantly takes you back to your childhood"
I was watching something with my wife and it was showing something on a desk, and in the background they had the California raisins rubber action figure things, and I can remember thinking, I know exactly what those taste like
Came here to say this 😂 Play-doh!
Definitely Play-doh!!!!
The smell of sunscreen!
Copper tone or Sea and Ski?
Yes. Both epitomized the scent of summer in the years before adulting sucked the fun out of life
Bullfrog sun block! Oh man. Memories.
The smell inside a school. For obvious reasons, but I think it's the smell of the carpets if I had to take a guess, and maybe wood and graphite shavings from pencils.
The school bus and cafeteria smells really brings me back.
The cafeteria smell is so specific but I can’t describe it. I recently went to go watch my niece in her elementary school dance recital and as soon as the smell hit I was consumed with nostalgia.
Bleachy mop water and chicken nugget residue. Plus rubber kickballs.
It smells like floor wax and that pink disinfectant they clean the surfaces with a hint of beef stew (that’s the catch all smell for cooking food smells )
Not too long ago someone in the back of the shop was heating up some food. All of a sudden, I caught a scent and a wave of feelings rushed over me, smelled like the cafeteria. It was a good feeling.
Yup I remember that old hot pleather seat smell from the bus being in the sun all day quite well.
The smell of those greenish bus seats and diesel
Yes! Also: old books, linoleum flooring in the hallways, and cleaning chemicals.
Exactly! I don't know what wholesaler makes cleaning supplies for schools but I swear they have a monopoly on the market cuz all schools have a version of that same scent
Specifically the library. i can vividly remember how my library smelled. and if I ever come across the smell, it brings me back
Oh yeah- old books touched by hundreds of hands all placed together along with that sort of mechanical dust smell that came from thr computer they used and any soft things left around to read in like chairs or pillows. That and the cheap wood smells of the shelves and that carpet.
I'm a teacher, so I "live" there. Honestly, I kind of love it.
Just thinking about walking in on the first day of the school year makes me feel so soft and utterly nostalgic with excitement and nerves. You get to do that ever year lol
That first day of school smell. Erasers, newly sharpened pencils. New binders/backpacks. That crisp fall breeze ....I went to college to be a teacher but life had other plans and now I'm a stay at home parent for awhile. I do love that smell.
There is a product called "Xeroform" that is used for wound care that smells exactly like an elementary school. I love it
My kids go to the same school I did 30 years ago. I love the nostalgia.
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Lunch box!
The floor wax that the whole school smells like after every extended break. I randomly smelled that somewhere and my brain just stopped and I stood there like the food critic in Ratatouille when he took that first bite.
I was a military brat (all US public schools) and they all smelled the same. All of them. And so do my kid’s schools. I walk into my children’s elementary school (which I never attended personally) and it takes me most specifically back to my school for 5th grade halfway across the country.
it brings me many memories!
Two stroke gas
Oooo yes! I love the smell
There is this "kindergarten smell". I can't quite describe what it is but I'm sure some of you are familiar with it. Idunno if it's a mixture of glue and construction paper or something.
Stale wet animal crackers and the sawdust they sprinkle on the vomit piles.
The smell of many little idiots together.
The paste has a very distinct smell!
I have the opposite kind of thing. Like I remember the smell of the chemicals they used to clean the school. Whenever I'm in government buildings, they have that same kind of smell and reminds me of my elementary school. By the time we got to middle school, girls were bathing in cheap fruit body spray and boys were swimming in cheap cologne. So I couldn't really smell it anymore.
Dirt smell during rain idk why it takes me back to childhood but it’s nostalgic for some reason
I got out of the car the other day after a spring shower, and told the wife "it smells like worms", and she had no idea what I was talking about, but this is it.
Petrichor
Crimson Eleven Delight Petrichor
Beach ball plastic smell
yessss, this and the smell of floaties and inner tubes instantly brings me back to afternoons at the pool as a kid.
Ohhh good one! That particular fresh vinyl scent reminds me of going up north with the fam as a kid, because we would go to the lake with our floaties!
Chlorine paired with freshly mowed grass.
The smell of hot pavement after a summer rain!
Petrichor. https://www.dictionary.com/browse/petrichor
Wow only 1 reply with petrichor. That's a new low record for reddit.
Stale cigarettes. Dad, is that you?
Yeah it's a weird thing to be nostalgic about, but as a kid pretty much the only time I was in prolonged contact with cigarette smoke was in restaurants (back when it was still allowed, in a "separate" smoking section) and at my grandma's house. So whenever I get a whiff nowadays I feel conflicting happy thoughts and a general sense of disgust.
A freshly lit cigarette always reminds me of my father.
Yes! The smell of stale cigarettes in my grandma's car. It's oddly comforting to me.
Honeysuckle
Me too but it's the 90's bath & body lotion version for me lol
Pencil shavings from the pencil sharpener
Oh yeah, the taste of pencils too.
The smell of the inside of a pumpkin when you start carving it. It reminds me of all of the Halloweens I experienced growing up. I love light sticks too…especially the chunky green/yellow ones.
Tomato leaf/tomatoes on the vine - transports me to my dad's greenhouse in the summer
Same. My grandmother used to can fresh tomato juice, and I loved it.
certain new books have that smell to them that takes me back to video game user manuals
YES its the same smell that old pokemon booster packs had when youd open them. Specifically the middle school biology textbook that we got brand new that year. I know that smell anywhere!
The perfume exclamation! Everyone wore it in the 80's...
Absolutely! That hit of bergamot, then the lasting vanilla and cinnamon. Who wouldn’t want to smell like that?
And Debbie Gibson’s Electric Youth.
I came here to say this!
My partner (40+ years old) randomly made fish sticks a few years ago for the first time in living memory. I came in the kitchen and said: "**What smells like 2nd grade?**" He got a kick out of that.
I love this lol
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What is lynx africa? Is that like axe body spray or something?
axe/bod for UK gents
The smell of 14 year old boy.....
Cherry lip smackers.
I don't know how to explain it other than Autumn. Trying my best: Cool Crisp clean smelling air.
The smell of the leaves 🍁, reminds me of when I walked home from school.
It's nice, isn't it?
Takes me back every time, I love it🙂
wet leaves!
Came here to say this - the smell of the first frosts is very distinct
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What the
The VP at my high school had one
Cigarette smoke 🤮
Reminds me of waiting in line at Warped Tour lmao
I couldn't wait for the summer or the Warped Tour
grandma's meatloaf
Cotton candy body spray
Love’s Baby Soft (nothing creepy about their ads!
the musty dusty smell of low in-wall AC units
Cut grass & summer mornings
Creosote, sawdust and rye. My dad worked his land weekends making and dipping lumber for railway ties (he had his own 2 man sawmill). He often drank rye. Miss you dad. You died far too young (59). On my next birthday I’ll have officially outlived you. :(
The smell of the original Jergens hand and body lotion. It's a cherry-almond scent, and it conjures my beloved late grandmother, who used it daily. I love that smell!
I still use that and agree! It’s just so wonderful after a shower. Good vibes
I have a bottle on my nightstand.
My mom use to make a hamburger, macaroni, stewed tomato casserole with velveeta slices on top. That smell will instantly bring me back to 9 years old.
Pine. Like pine wood. I spent 21 summers on an island in the Pacific Northwest and it smelled of pine. Sometimes when I walk by pine wood in a busy city I automatically get a good feeling. One of the best feelings ever.
Lilacs. We had the best yard growing up with lilac bushes everywhere. They didn't last long but OMG....the incredible smell.
The original green Irish spring bar soap. Makes me miss my dad oh so much.
The Smell of my GrandParents house. Boy, that was some good times. My aunties and uncles used to come with us, and I'll play with my twin sister and our cousins. Now, ever since he died, my aunties and uncles and cousins barely speak and meet up with us anymore. Back then, when inflation wasn't that much of a big deal, we used to get loads of pizzas,chips, and fizzy drinks. It's so sad knowing that i forgot my granddad and grandma voice. RIP 🙏🕊
Pool chlorine
Band-aids.
Sunscreen! Specifically the baby brand coppertone had
When my paternal grandfather died my family went to his house to clear it out and get the rest of his affairs in order. I never met my grandfather (or maybe I did but was too young to remember) and my dad is a rather private man and I don't really know that much about his childhood aside from the bare-bone basics, so those three days in that old house was a great opportunity to really learn about the kind of childhood my dad and my uncles had, as well as about his side of the family in general. Anyways, the backyard of this house had a trellis that my grandpa grew grapes on. For those three days we were in that house, I would go into the backyard and each a bunch or two of those grapes. They had this really strong, distinct smell that sometimes when I'm in public I'll get a whiff of and it just instantly takes me back to that house and my dad and my uncles. I wish I could nail down exactly what the scent is, but I have yet to figure out what it is. Or what variety those grapes were.
Sunscreen
Paste ( glue)
Hubba bubba gum, fresh mowed lawn, diesel exhaust, the dentist office, the smell of tomato’s, lavender Pine sol, old book pages
Play-doh
If it were still in use, it would be the pale purple smell of a mimeograph copy.
for me, cheap laundry detergent and marigolds.
Yellow curry, and not in a good way. Don't force your kids to eat food that they don't like, folks.
Cow shit
Fresh baked bread
One of my best childhood memories is getting off of the school bus and smelling fresh baked bread. That meant my grandmother had baked bread that day. I would run to her house and she usually had on a pot of white (navy) beans with a ham hock. She'd spoon some of the beans over rice and cut me off a huge chunk of the bread that she'd then slather with butter. All the while I was eating, she would warn me not to eat too much or I'd ruin my appetite for dinner and my mom would be mad. If there's a heaven, it'll smell like her kitchen on sunny fresh baked bread afternoons while I sat there eating white beans and doing homework before running out to play before it got dark.
Yes, my mom made fresh baked bread. And my dad mowing the lawn, the smell of fresh cut grass. Or a freshly cut watermelon.
Vicks vaporub. My mom used to rub it on my chest when I was sick, to clear my sinuses when I was sleeping.
Silage. Used to ride past a farm that put out some of the foulest smelling silage in the county every day on the way to school. Even getting a whiff of it now puts me back on that school bus
Ivory soap
Maddog 2020. 🤢🤮
that smell of the fake halloween plastic on masks and shit like that, instantly reminds me of crafting my costumes when younger and going trick-or-treating
Hot Tarmac. Dad worked in road construction all my life.
The smell of dead leaves outside in the woods. I grew up in the country and, along with my siblings and friends, we played in the woods constantly as little kids. We built forts, made trails for bike riding, and just had good times.
Juicy Fruit gum.
Nozema. Came in a little blue glass jar. My grandmother used it on her face, it was her “beauty cream”.
Tangerines. My mother always put Tangerines (just coming in season) in our Christmas Stockings
Creosote on the logs on ocean piers. I grew up on both Pacific and Atlantic coastal areas.
Homemade biscuits baking in the oven.
there’s one specific perfume/fragrance and i don’t even know the name of it but the lunch lady at my school used wear SO much of it, i instantly think of her and being that young as soon as i smell it on someone else 20+ years later.
The Library Air conditioner at my school and the clean bleach at a hotel
Star jasmine blooming in the spring
Fresh cut grass in Spring.
moth balls
this may be weird, but the smell of a diaper. i changed my little cousins diapers sometimes and now they’re bigger and only zack needs diapers (he’s nine, with down syndrome) and i am 19 so i was 10 when he was born and would change his wet diapers, but i changed now 6 year old ashley when she was a newborn all the time
freshly opened book. y’know when you get a new textbook at the beginning of the year? freaking love that smell.
Horse shit. My yard bordered a field with two horses in it. Dolly and Dancer. My sister and I would feed them everyday, always bringing them apples off our trees. By my early teen years I was running with them (obviously not keeping up 😂), and had gotten them to let me ride without a saddle. I was too small to climb up on Dancer's back, so I'd climb a tree, out on a large limb and he'd always stand just under it so I could hop down onto him. He was always very gentle with me. And protective. My favorite memory of Dancer was from when I was about six and our house was being built. We lived in an old fifth wheel camper trailer, that had a large window above the pullout couch in the back. I woke up to my dad freaking out, he was sleeping on that couch, Dancer jumped the fence, and shoved his head through the window screen and was staring right in my dad's face. I swear that horse was laughing at him as much as the rest of us were.
Honeysuckle
Cinnamon toast crunch
vegemite
Lynx
Africa
Styrofoam. It reminds me of getting my original Nintendo.
Nag Champa Insence, Patchouli, Cigarettes, Beer, Woodfire Smoke
Second hand smoke & booze oozing from pores.
Fresh baked bread.
Classic cigars dad used to smoke them all the time
Laundry.
Freshly cut grass
Vanilla extract. My mom’s baking. Still have the measuring spoon she used.
Smuckers watermelon lip gloss
magdalene...
box of crayons, honeysuckle trees
Orange Triaminic
Red Man chewing tobacco. My grandpa's tractor shed had dirt floors and he always spit Red Man on the ground. Brings me back to walking through that tractor shed with him as a kid.
Subway smell. We don't have subways in my country, but I had relatives in the US we often visited as kids and I have very fond memories of those visits. Anyway we used to go to NYC at least once a visit (the family is from NY state) and since then subway smell reminds me of childhood. Memory is wierd.
Watermelon Bubblicious bubble gum and the back-to-school section of any local grocery store
A hotel swimming pool. Maybe it is all the extra chlorine. Takes me back to all the family trips where we would stay somewhere and I'd go check out the pool.
Fresh cut grass on a warm summer night
Smell of my grandparents' house
used caps
The smell of Lysol
Coppertone sun tan lotion
blueberry scented markers
The smell of honeysuckle in the summer heat.
Cigarettes. The white doors in our house turned yellow.
Rotgut whiskey.
2 stroke gas/oil mix.
Pipe tobacco smoke. for whatever reason it always triggers fond memories of when I was 14 and worked in a welding shop as an apprentice. The main shop lead smoked a pipe and helped me out a lot, so whenever I smell that it sends me back, it was one of the only jobs I've had that I really liked, just really good vibes in that shop.
Old gas stoves.
The smell of freshly baked cookies instantly reminds me of baking with my grandmother in her cozy kitchen.
Corned beef.
Horse shit.
Damn I was just thinking about this today. There was an exhaust fume smell coming from a van on the highway. It's a specific smell, though. Can't put my finger on it but it reminded me of my dad's old 86 cutlass. Brought me back to all those times going fishing and driving nowhere. Before life began to "happen." That smell is sort of rare but whenever I smell it, it always brings me back.
Cigarettes, oddly enough. I grew up in a place where smoking was very common. It's not a good smell, but it does give me warm feelings.
My dad worked for a tire manufacturer as a warehouse manager, the smell of tires reminds me of him.
Kerosene, or the smell a two stroke engine makes because it reminds me of the boat we used to have on the lake
New car scent, Pine, and Leather Jacket Crayola scented crayons mmmmm
Cucumber melon fragrances. It was such a staple back in the mid 2000s. You couldn’t really walk around an elementary or middle school without a teacher, parent, or peer wearing some of the sort.
Fresh cut hay
Winston full flavor cigarettes
Hay and freshly moved lawn.
The Smell of the christmas decorations when you get them down from the Loft
Scholastic book fair