A coworker was selling Gold Canyon Co. jar candles as a fundraiser for her sons’ boy scout troop, and dropped my 2 items off in my courtroom this morning. I took a whiff of the scent called Ginger Lime and was instantly taken back to 1982. I was 6, freshly in the country, running around in our first apartment in Rowland Heights. The apartment complex was owned by my aunt and uncle, and all 4 adults were cleaning it after the last renters moved out. There was some cleaner they were using, I believe it was something similar to the powdered Comet or Ajax, that smelled exactly like this candle. The scent makes me think of furry foamy brown carpet, shelving paper with designs of mushrooms (which my mom cut out and gave me as stickers to play with), paneled tinted mirrors covering one wall with gold splashes on them.

Heh, so 80s.

Ooh, and a tan stuffed bear half the size of my 6-year-old non-English-speaking self, which had been left behind in the 2-bedroom apartment and which my parents/aunt had washed for me and gave me. The bear’s fur got spikey and ruined with the washing, and they couldn’t comb it out to make it fluffy again, so my other aunt knitted a brown shirt that looks rather like a smock for my bear to wear, and cover as much spikey fur as possible.

Heh, so ghetto.