Kent Cigarettes and Chanel No. 5

It was a combination of smells, a not necessarily harmonious duet of cigarette smoke and perfume. Every Sunday that year, so it seemed, Danny’s mother would dab on Chanel No. 5 and smoke Kents (with the micronite (asbestos) filter), with the veil on her hat pulled up so it wouldn’t catch fire. She drove Danny and his two brothers to Sunday school, as usual with her left foot on the brake and her right foot on the accelerator of the ‘56 Ford station wagon. As she drove, she smoked and emitted Chanel No. 5 rays until both smells imprinted themselves indelibly on Danny’s brain. Danny’s mother couldn’t understand why the brakes on the Ford had to be re-lined so often. Every time the car came back from the shop, she and Danny’s father would bicker for what seemed like hours over who was putting all the wear and tear on the brakes. These scenes always blew over after Danny’s mother had had her evening cocktail – the Sweet Evening Breeze, she called it. The Sunday morning ritual played itself out when Danny’s mother parked the Ford down by the cemetery and initiated the Sunday Facial Scrub. It never failed. On Sundays Danny and his brothers always left home so clean they squeaked, but they mysteriously turned into disgusting little urchins by the time they got to church. So Danny’s mother would pull a lipstick-stained tissue out of her purse, spit on it, and scrub the boys’ faces as if she were cleaning toilets, all the while muttering about the injustice of having male children.