Fried Eggs

Smells can evoke memories of a childhood, special occasions, or quiet moments like lying in a field of flowers.

My special smell is fried eggs

As a young child, plenty of time was spent with my grandparents, who lived in a rambling house. They took in boarders to supplement their income, which led to quite an entertaining lifestyle with all the coming and goings.

Grandpa, a tall man, totally bald with a head that shone from a daily Vaseline polish, had a secret vice. He drank. Not too much, but enough to give himself away every now and then - he was a lover of the fruit of the vine.

Grandmother, a tiny lady, had no time for any alcohol consumption whatsoever.
So every now and then harsh words would be spoken regarding this vice.
Grandpa kept his bottle hidden near the garden shed, among the ferns and many an hour was spent looking after these ferns, with the occasional slurp for fortification.

Well, one day, there must have been a problem with the ferns as Grandpa’s intake of this humble fruit, the fermented grape, was a little excessive. Grandpa staggered into the kitchen to his favorite spot right next to the big cast iron coal stove, and sat down somewhat heavily, almost flattening the cat, who took off with a highly indignant screech. In the cat’s haste to avoid being totally flattened, he knocked over grandpa’s tea, which in turn soaked grandpa’s last packet of cigarettes

“Hettie,” he said indignantly, "Look at what that darn cat has done! Now get me some more tea and cigarettes.”
Grandmother looked across and noticed for the first time that grandpa was a bit under the weather,

“Aubrey” she exclaimed crossly “you have been drinking again!"

“Never!” said grandpa somewhat aggressively, “where would I get a drink from?"

In reply, Grandmother turned around, grabbed the frying pan and with a resounding boom, hit Grandpa on his chrome dome. I can still clearly hear the echo of that pan on Grandpa’s head. It seemed to echo around the room for a least a minute. By this stage, the balance of dogs and cats had gone hurtling out to the safety of the garden, in fear of having a frying pan on their heads.We all sat in absolute silence. Grandpa got up without saying a word, and went to bed.

The following morning. Grandpa could not understand where the rather large bump on his head came from. Grandmother told him that he had accidentally hit his head on the kitchen geyser. She feigned surprise that he couldn't remember, as we sniggered behind our hands.

So forever thereafter, we ate curved fried eggs, as the center of the pan was quite well dented. This added a new dimension to sunny side-up eggs, and to this day whenever I smell fried eggs, I am reminded of a frying pan sounding like a church bell.

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