Clairalience

 I mentioned Clairalience in my last post as one of the multiple 'Clair-' abilities.  The others being Clairvoyant - seeing the unseen, Clairaudient - hearing the unheard, Clairsentience - feeling, either the emotions or physical pain of an entity, Clairgustance - tasting something that isn't actually there (I've never experienced this myself but my sister has.  More on that later), Claircognizance - knowing something we, by all rights, should not be able to know.  This one I've also had occurrences multiple times in my life that I'll go into another time.  And as the title mentioned, Clairalience - the ability to smell something which isn't there.  And that's what I'll primarily be focusing on during this post.  

The floral fragrance that I experienced with dad at Chaucer was the first time I can vividly recall that happening to me.  That's not to say it didn't happen earlier in life at other times.  Just that this specific time is my first time recalling it happening and recognizing it in that moment.  And it's happened a number of times since and I wanted to share a few of them here as they all seem to be directly tied to what may be on the other side of the veil.  

The most significant time I experienced Clairalience was in the days shortly after dad passed away.  This would have been back in 2012, in the week after his demise, I was working on putting myself into a blackout drunken stupor at the time.  I have to be honest, even though we had known this was going to be the eventual outcome for dad, even though we spent months preparing ourselves for the inevitable, when the time finally did come, I honestly wasn't ready for it.  And in those days, weeks and months that followed, I spent a LOT of time doing what I could to numb the pain.  
And so it was in this state of mind that I was several bottles deep into my nightly routine of blubbering on the couch and/or living room floor watching tv, tears would go from simple trickles down my cheek to full-on, body shuddering heaves that left me physically tired.  It was a Wednesday night, I was on the floor, between the TV stand and ottoman, bottle of Dos Equis almost gone and it hit me.  
Dad had this very distinct body odor.  I still can't forget it to this day.  It wasn't the Speedstick deodorant that he always used, it wasn't the Tres Flores brilliantine that he used in his hair, no, dad's body odor was very acidic, very similar to olive oil to me.  Not exactly but along those lines.  And that's the scent I caught in my living room that night.  It lingered, too.  Not like the flowers at Chaucer that was there and gone.  Dad's scent stayed with me a little longer than that.  Enough that once I caught the aroma, I breathed it in again.  A proper lung full.  By the time I exhaled and tried to catch it again, it was quickly becoming as faint as the flowers.  Gone.  I can only assume it was dad stopping by to visit me that night.  You know, he never came to visit me in that apartment while I was living there.  I lived there almost 3 years before he passed.  But he just wasn't driving anymore and climbing a full flight of stairs in his declining health just wasn't going to be happening.  But I have no doubt he came to visit me that night.  Whether it was just to check up on me, let me know he was finally better off or even if it was his way to say goodbye, I don't know.  
I think in that week between his passing and his life celebration, he was making the rounds visiting us kids and grandkids.  My sister-in-law told me that her youngest, who was 6 at the time woke up with a bolt in the middle of one night that week and just sat up and said, "Grandpa!" The other wonder twin, my sister's oldest, would dream of dad in the coming weeks and after as well.  Which made sense because he was one of the grandkids who spent the most time with him before dad went into the hospital.  I never asked any of the other kids if they were visited by dad but it's also been 10 years so I don't know if they'd remember after so long since they were all so young when he passed.  

The most recent experiences with Clairalience that I've encountered have been less personal and actually very recent.  As in, within the past year since I've started going on paranormal investigations and ghost walks locally.  The first time was at the Alexandria Ballrooms tour I went on with Haunted by History Author, Craig Owens.  The Alexandria Hotel is pretty much bordering skid row, just a short walk from the notorious Cecil Hotel in DTLA.  The Alexandria was THE place to see and be seen in a town before Hollywood was truly born.  While we were visiting the ballrooms and getting as much historical information from Craig, he took us to the staircase where he's mentioned guests of the hotel and film crews have seen apparitions walking up and down the stairs at random moments throughout the hotel's history.  And it was in this stairwell that I was struck by the smell, very distinct smell of cigarette smoke.  To me it literally smelled like someone had just been walking the stairs and was smoking along the way.  Which, not only was there nobody in the group smoking, the building itself is a non-smoking facility.  There's no way someone could have snuck into that stairwell to light up without having been seen by multiple people, much less dissipate any cloud of smoke for it to smell like it did.  

The next tour I went on where I caught the smell of something was with Haunted Orange County at the Kellogg House in Santa Ana.  Not to be confused with the Kellogg House in Pomona.  Hiram Kellogg of Santa Ana was a surveyor and engineer, not related the breakfast food magnate who owned the Pomona property.  It was at the end of the tour, we were all leaving the house and thanking Helen for letting us visit the home and I was stepping out the front door to the porch when I suddenly caught the aroma of smoke.  It was either a cigar or pipe smoke.  Much more aromatic than cigarette smoke, heavier, bolder.  And again, nobody around to be creating that.  In fact, I'm quite certain the entire property is non-smoking.  I mean, 100 year old wooden homes, you better believe they're not going to allow anyone to light anything on the porch.  And yet, there it was.  Very clearly, very distinct smell of smoke lingering outside the front door.  I should have asked our docent if Hiram was a smoker but the whole thing didn't really register with me and what it was until I was already in my car pulling out of the parking lot.  

Lastly and most recently a scent that hit me out of the ether was at an investigation with Craig Owens' group at the Warner Grand Theater in San Pedro.  I had been on a previous investigation at theater and while there were a handful of other activities to occur before, that second investigation seemed to yield much more EVPs than the first trip.  But the clairalience I experienced was during a quiet moment for me in the upstairs lobby.  The other investigators/guests were either upstairs in the projection booth, downstairs in the restroom lobby or under the stage.  I was sitting between the restroom doors, camera gear down, still recording everything just in case and I was suddenly hit by the scent of shoe polish.  Very unusual since I wasn't wearing dress shoes and there was no one else nearby.  I could only assume that at some point in the theater's 90-year history, there may have been a shoeshine stand right about where I was sitting.  Logically it makes sense as it's a theater and people used to dress up for a night out on the town.  The fact that San Pedro is also a port, so Seamen would likely have stopped by the theater on leave, shoeshines would have been a common thing.  I just need to find out if there was a shine stand upstairs, if at all.   

And to just wrap this up on the Clair- senses, I mentioned my sister experienced Clairgustance at least once before.  And that was during her quinceañera.  During the church service as she was receiving communion, the priest gave her the Eucharist, just a small wafer of bread, and she said as she was eating it, that it felt and tasted like meat.  "This is my body."