Sigh. Some People are so Clueless
It appears the NY Times is testing the waters on stories exploring the paranormal. Google "paranormal stories NY Times" and you will see a number of stories published in 2015. I may have posted one of their other stories here.
But this opinion piece is by a woman who writes ghost stories! And she can't figure this phenomenon out! In search of an answer, she goes to all the wrong places. Sheesh--why on earth would she ask these people? If you're trying to understand a visit by a spirit, you don't go to a scientist, you go to somebody like Theresa Caputo.
Here are the legal four paragraphs and the link to the rest of the story. She writes beautifully, and she paints a vivid portrait of her mother-in-law. If you like good writing, it's worth the read.
The Smell of Loss
by Julie Myerson
LONDON THE first time it happens is a dark winters afternoon, not quite a year after her death. Im at my desk working, and there it suddenly is: sharp, glassy-green, with that faint, musky undertone that catches at the back of your throat.
I recognize it instantly: the scent that hung in our hall every time she came to supper. The perfume that clung to her coat, her scarves, detectable sometimes for hours on my babies hair after shed been carrying and kissing them.
That first time, its a shock. Her perfume is something Ive long forgotten (in her final months, mostly bedridden, she was beyond all that). But here it is absolute and definite and quite overpowering. It lasts for three, maybe four minutes, long enough for me to get up and start searching the room for its source (my daughter, Chloë, has a few of her cardigans did she leave one in here?).
Then, just as suddenly, its gone.
More at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/03/opinion/sunday/the-smell-of-loss.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-right-region®ion=opinion-c-col-right-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-right-region&_r=0
Cher