The Smell My Hands Give Off

I raise my hands to my face. Trying to lessen some tension between my eyes. I am distracted though, breathing in through my nose. I smell my skin.

I smell my skin and it is foreign to me. Foreign and at once familiar. How can something that covers your entire body give off no scent to you at all? I do not know why that scent that surrounds me should escape me, when I feel as though it is the scent I should know the strongest. It is me, it is my own. It is one of the things I bring to others and I do not know it at all.

Is it the clothes I wear. The soap I use. The detergent I've bought. The sheets in which I sleep. The air in my room. The dust on my floor. The clothes from today. The clothes from yesterday. The furniture I've had for years. What is it exactly that gives me my smell? Something within, something that escapes me, something in cells and follicles that is brought out by the sun. Something I cannot put my finger on.

I know when the smell is bad. Why do I not know when the smell is good? Why is the good thing invisible? I feel like most of the time there is the good thing, and it's the good thing I don't know. I do now know it at all.

What do others think when I get near. Where do they think I live. What do they think I do. Do they think I'm clean. Are they getting the right impression. Do they know who I am. Am I making sure they know who I am. Am I doing enough.

All I had to do was bring my hands to my face. Was think a thought. A thing unrelated. It's a domino effect, it is. All I wanted to do was press my fingers in between my eyes. Relieve the tension. I don't want this skin plaguing on my mind. I don't want this scent to be the only thing I try to sense. I want what the others have.