Win. A friend of mine from southern Germany became infected with the virus in an Austrian ski resort right at the beginning of the Corona wave. The course of the illness was so severe that she had to be hospitalized. To this day, she still has the loss of both her sense of smell and her sense of taste. She hasn’t been able to smell anything for three years, and when she eats, she has to eat very spicy food to even notice anything, she tells me.
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How does she deal with it? It causes her a lot of grief. “You should write something about that,” she says. It’s not that bad. The people who hear about it don’t exactly agree with this attitude. “But I read this attitude in many faces.” Not being able to smell, not being able to taste, that’s just the way it is. In addition, you always hear that the sensory perceptions return later.
No more uncorked bottles of wine
For the wine connoisseur, her world collapsed when she realized that this situation was no longer improving and that it might remain forever. She hasn’t uncorked a single bottle since. She also used to enjoy cooking, but if you don’t smell and taste, you’re entering an unknown landscape at the stove, she explains to me. “As if your hiking map had been taken away from you. You don’t know where you’re going anymore.”
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These days I threw our tomato plants into the compost heap. This year we saved them in heavy pots from the army of snails on our balcony. The smell of tomatoes is one of the most beautiful smells I can ever imagine. It is in all parts of the plant, every leaf pore breathes it. As everyone knows, tomatoes are not just tomatoes, even as a fruit. I broke the stems while standing by the compost heap. With my eyes closed, I held them in front of my face while breathing deeply. It was my farewell to summer. This miracle of taste and smell will be created again next year. But for me this is no longer a given.
SZ
