Maybe it's true with all of our senses, that more often than not the negative experiences seem to linger the longest. Why is that? Is it our inherent need to savor the negativity?
As a Social Worker, I often found myself in not so pleasant home environments. For the past two years, I have been removed from the field for the most part. A part that I often do miss. Not that I miss witnessing first hand neglect or abuse, but the ability to be an active part of change. To embrace the opportunity to actually make a difference, however minute. Today I had the opportunity to step back into the worker role...and into the home of a "cluttered house". For me, "clutter" is as much to clutter as my "paradise resort" was to paradise, rather paradoxyl.
My co-worker and I had the fortunate opportunity to be escorted outside the residence for our long interview/home call. This allowed us to get a great majority of the crisp fall air pungent with cigar like unfiltered cigarettes and a mixture of aromatic stench seeping from the windows above. At the end of the visit, we had been given permission to enter the residence and observe it's current "cluttered" condition.
To say the home was appalling would be an understatement. Not only was wading through the small walkways and observing the living conditions memorable enough, the stench was enough to seep through every pore of our being and permeate us throughout. The drive back to the office with the windows down did little to alleviate us of the stench.
I was fortunate to come home and be able to enter my clean house. To take a long hot shower. To cleanse my nostrils and rid myself of the odor. While the smell continued to linger for me, it wasn't on my clothes, it wasn't on me.
The smell was in me. I can still smell it. Why if I had gone to a beautiful home with fresh baked cookies will those wonderful smells not remain?
Why?
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