I am watering the plants in my garden this morning, in advance of another day of 100 degree heat. The stench of herbicide and/or pesticide is in the air. Am I the only one who notices this?
Nearly every person I see in this town, as well as the travelers who stay at the motel where I work, are smokers. More than half of them are also obese. I see them walking out the door, cigarette in hand, anxious to light up. The acrylic shield that had been placed at the front desk during COVID, was taken down when my new manager took over. Now whenever a smoker stands across from me to check in, their cigarette breath blasts me in the face when they exhale forcefully. Or, the concentrated odor from their clothing drifts over the counter to where I am standing. The rock that borders the building and the parking lot is strewn with cigarette butts because the smokers are too lazy to dispose of them properly. They often stand just outside the doors or outside the laundry room, where I spend time folding the motel laundry, so that smoke comes in whenever the door is opened or it comes in through the vents for the air conditioning. Consequently, whenever I get home after work my clothes and hair smell of cigarettes. When I get out of my truck to walk into the grocery store, there is generally cigarette smoke in the air, from people sitting in their vehicles, as well as others walking to and from the store. When I return with the groceries that I have purchased, along with water bottles that I have filled, to my truck, I often have to hold my breath or cover my face because the air is rank with cigarette smoke.
In casual conversations, people tell me that they need to spray their yards or that someone is coming to spray for them. They say these things matter-of-factly, as though it is a perfectly normal and natural thing to do. If I told them that the sprays are deadly, not only to insects and weeds, but also to other living things, to themselves, to their children and grandchildren, they would choose not to hear me. They prefer the comfort of their own ignorance.
Whenever a person cannot hear, they are said to be deaf. When they cannot see, they are called blind. People can turn a deaf ear and be blind to what is right in front of them. To my knowledge, there is no word to describe those who cannot smell. What little they can smell, they cover with artificial fragrances. The fact is that people can choose what to see, what to hear, and what to smell. When they choose not to see the eyesores, not to hear the grating cacophony of noise, and not to smell the poisons that have saturated our air, they are blind and deaf and numb to the carnage that they contribute to on a daily basis.
