Pronunciation: (n.) the scent that lingers in air, the trail left in water, the impression made in space after something or someone has been and gone; the trace of someone\u2019s perfume.<\/p>\n Origin: A poetical word, to be sure, when romancing over a love long-gone.<\/p>\n But perhaps you find sillage in other places and spaces \u2026<\/p>\n \u2026 like when you pull up in your car to pick up your children from school and they sense the lingering aroma of the cheeseburger you wolfed down a moment earlier. Suspicion arises.<\/p>\n That kind of sillage \u2026 not so poetical.<\/p>\n Or when you move into a new house and smell the persistent bouquet of a woman\u2019s perfume. But only at midnight. On Halloween.<\/p>\n Thanks to that type of sillage, you now know to pack up and move once again.<\/p>\n How about the sillage of your grandmother\u2019s hand lotion, your dad\u2019s motor oil, or the scent of a new baby\u2019s scalp?<\/p>\n Only the nose knows.<\/p>\n Photo by Angela Andriot via Wikimedia Commons<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n \t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What’s that smell? No, not the stuff in the silo (silage)\u2014that distinct odor of fermenting corn or hay\u2014but that lovely, faint, lingering scent … sillage Pronunciation: [sil-ij] (n.) the scent that lingers in air, the trail left in water, the … Continue reading
\n[sil<\/strong>-ij]<\/p>\n
\nFrench, literally, wake\/trail<\/p>\n![](\"http:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/600px-Perfume_Bottles.jpg\")