In the 70s, when I was a teenager, my bedroom reeked of incense I had bought at the Cook Street Market in Auckland. I lit those sticks daily and wafted around my bedroom trying out the latest outfits I had put together on my sewing machine. I was probably also listening to Carole King’s album Tapestry.
Just writing about this makes me feel a strong sense of nostalgia, like looking at an old 70s photo with its orange tint which makes all the colours look so autumnal.
My father has always had a really strong sense of smell, so it was no surprise to me that when I lit my first incense stick he came rushing along the hall from the other end of the house within seconds to check I wasn’t smoking some sort of illegal substance.
When I showed him the innocent, fragrant incense stick he was still not quite sure that what I was doing was legal, but he left me to it anyway.
From that day on, when I returned from school, I would open the door to my bedroom and it smelled like me. A mix of musk (very big in the 70s), a hint of frangipani and patchouli. Heaven.
Without realising it I had created a safe haven for
