Learning How to smell a tree A lot of my friends and colleagues tell me that they are trading commuting time with time in nature. David Haskell suggests that to really experience our place in the natural world we should do more than just look at and listen to the trees. He says that we should stop and smell them, too. He offers five guided practices that yield a "wordless sensory experience, a connection that unites human bodies and consciousness to plants’ inner worlds". If this suggestion conjures images of people literally hugging trees, relax. He starts right in your kitchen: "Treat your nose to an inventory of the trees in your home. Lift a cup of black tea to your nose. Camellia leaves, redolent of East Asia mountains. Dig your thumb into orange peel. Sharp oils, deterrents for hungry inspects. Unscrew the cinnamon jar. Whose hands peeled this bark from the coppiced tree?". "Aroma is the primary language of trees. They talk with molecules, conspiring with one another, beckoning fungi, scolding insects, and whispering to microbes. Aroma is also our primal tongue, a direct link to memory and emotion, an inheritance from the communicative networks that sustained the first animal cells. The receptors in our nasal passages are ready to listen. We have over one hundred different olfactory receptors, able to discern at least ten thousand odors. The English language is too meager to categorize this multiplicity, but our bodies know how to respond. Noses, though, need the help of conscious intention to put them in the right place." Article: The Aromas of Trees: Five Practices