That which we call a cabbage…

I have a poor sense of smell.  Actually, “poor” is the wrong word.  “Silly” is better.

As a child, I could smell nothing at all, ever.  This was quite handy, because I was mercifully excluded from those torturous games in which my nice little peers indulged: they would find something disgusting and shove it under each others’ noses to see who might faint, accompanied by a rousing chorus of “eeeeuuuurgh!”

Now I can very rarely smell things.  Not very often and it does have to be a very strong smell.  But I can.  And I have absolutely no idea what it is, unless I am told or see what’s making the smell.  In other words, my brain seems to have missed out on the “learning a smell” phase and just makes it up as it goes along.  This was nicely illustrated quite recently when I came into the kitchen after an evening in the sitting room.  There was A Smell.  My first thought was that Foul Ol’ Dog had lived up to her name & done something.  So I hunted, but found nothing.  I even got the torch out & looked in dark corners.  Nothing.  Then I wondered if something was burning, so I checked if there was anything left in the oven or under the hot-plate lids.  Nothing.  Then I went into the scullery and saw the bread-machine light flashing “Ready!” and The Smell instantly resolved itself into A Nice Homely Baking Smell.  I had to know it was bread to be able to make it smell like it.

So what’s this got to do with wool, or more specifically, the very pretty plait of BFL tops (pictured above) which I bought from The Yarn Yard at Woolfest?  I didn’t have time for proper shopping at the fest, but managed to get some things quickly whilst on my rounds or at the beginning & end of the show.  First thing on Friday morning, I visited Natalie’s stand before the show opened (mainly to calm myself down with the pretty colours I knew I’d find there) and came away with a couple of very lovely plaits, including that one, which then spent the morning around my neck because I didn’t have time to find anywhere to put them (until I got my purple Rav Bag from Amber).  I hadn’t looked at the labels when I bought them, since Mr. Yarn Yard had very kindly pointed me at the BFL and told me the price.

Only when I got it out to spin a couple of weeks ago, did I look at the label.  It was called “Cabbage”.  Fine!  I love cabbages!  I love growing them, looking at them, eating them (especially steamed with a little cream, butter, nutmeg…).   Every aspect of cabbage is beloved.  I have no idea what they smell like, since the nose has never been working when I’ve been cooking or eating them.  If I sniff one in the garden in the rain, there’s a sort of vague, generic wet-greenery smell & that’s it.  And the name was appropriate: the colours were like a freshly-chopped Savoy, the greens & blues of the outer leaves and the yellow of the heart.

When I started spinning it, I could smell something.   All the time I was spinning & then knitting with it, there was a smell.   I asked people who can smell, who assured me there was no smell at all, other than a usual slight woolliness.

But as soon as I had seen the word “cabbage”, in fact, the smell had arrived.  It was the smell of corridors in institutions built in the 19th century.  I have clearly read so many books with instances of corridors smelling of cabbage that apparently I only had to think of the word & there was the smell.  I made it up, it was not real, but it wouldn’t go away.  The more I thought about it, the more it persisted.  But I was not going to be stopped by a smell, particularly a fictitious one, and here’s what the beautiful plait turned into:

The booties on the right are for a new baby in the village.  The socks were commissioned by my friend Ruth for a new baby in her family in Canada, along with the yarn which she’s making into a matching hat.

It was delightful to spin and I’m looking forward to getting the other plait I bought from Natalie on to the wheel.

I’m quite relieved, however, that this one doesn’t appear to have a name…