Day 17

There is a particular smell that I associate with winter.  I don't know how to describe it, but I can tell you how to make it.  I accidentally made it today without realizing that's what I was doing.  It's simple really.  Here's how:

Step 1-  Realize that your house is dry beyond all belief because it is winter, and the heater is literally sucking all of the moisture out of your body.

Step 2- Ponder getting a humidifier, because you know that would be the easy way to take care of it.

Step 3- After thinking about that for days, realize that your house is still dry, and you should really do something about it before all of the skin on your hands falls off.

Step 4- Remember the way your mother dealt with it.  She'd put a cast iron kettle on the fireplace, full of water, and just let it steam.  

Step 5- Look around for a cast iron kettle.  Realize that you don't have one.  Guess that a regular pot will have to do. 

Step 6- Fill pot with water, and set it on to a gentle simmer.

Step 7- Think endlessly about pasta for almost every meal.

Step 8- Eventually, peel one orange, and eat the flesh.  Drop the peel into the pot of boiling water, because that's what your mother did with her orange peels when there was a cast iron kettle full of boiling water nearby.

Step 9- Occasionally refill the pot, and watch the water get darker and darker with concentrated orange oil or something.  

Step 10-  Inhale deeply.  You should have now created this uniquely winter smell.  It doesn't smell like oranges anymore.  It smells slightly muskier, with only hints of what it used to be.  Also, you should notice that your skin isn't quite as dry, and your hair isn't as frizzy.  You should also be less prone to electrocution by static build-up.

To vary things up, you can use the peel of almost any citrus fruit, and get slightly different smells.  The true smell is, of course, produced only with oranges.  Also, you might try adding cinnamon sticks, but that seems like a waste of such a wonderful thing.