Not all smelly days are unpleasant. Some days have the pleasant and soothing smell of clothes that have dried outside in sunshine or smelling coconut suntan oil at the pool. I also enjoy days smelling clean babies and puppy dogs’ ears.

I was exposed to some interesting smells when I went to work for a grocery store after graduating from high school. But there was this one day that was so smelly that it is still burned into my mind and my nose.

Here in East Tennessee, many people still farm and have gardens, so canning season has always been a big deal. Naturally, the store I worked at stocked up on canning supplies during that time. They were displayed in the front of the store, not far from the cash registers. This included huge glass jars of vinegar that stacked and lined up across the front of the picture windows. At that time, glass containers were the norm instead of plastic.

Let me tell you, those glass jars always made me nervous. Every time I rolled a buggy by them, I was extra careful. I didn’t want to be the one to crash into the glass jars and cause a stinky mess.

The first Friday after the display went up was hectic as usual, and unfortunately, people had yet to adjust to the display and the glass jars. You see, not only did they take up a lot of space, there was less room to maneuver around them. Do you see where I am going with this?

Yep, one of the bag boys slammed a cart full of groceries into the glass jars. To be honest, I was relieved it wasn’t me. Anyway, it wasn’t just one that broke. Oh no, a few of them crashed onto the floor, which sent vinegar surging across the front of the store. I guess you could call it a vinegar flash flood. Also, big pieces of sharp-edged glass were strewn about.

Until that day, the smell of vinegar brought back pleasant memories of dying Easter Eggs with my mom. But this overpowering stench caused my eyes to water as they stung and the insides of my nose felt burned. Next, I developed a headache and I am sure others did as well.

My gut reaction was to get away from there as fast as I could, but being an employee, I was stuck at my position. Looking around, I saw people coughing and trying to cover their faces with their hands. Some were fanning with whatever they could get their hands on in order to get rid of the horrid fumes.

Others desperately tried to escape out the door and into fresh air. They rammed buggies into each other as they dodged the pieces of broken glass. Some who just had a bag or two, hopscotched across the front, splattering the vinegar as they went.

It was like watching a cross between an obstacle course and a demolition derby with grocery filled buggies. Nowadays, it could be a new reality show where people have to jump their full buggies over a moat of vinegar to win free groceries. I don’t know about you, but for free groceries, I would try it.

Of course, some people became angry. It didn’t seem to help much when we employees apologized for the stinky and messy inconvenience. Hello, we were suffering too. Then some of us began to joke about it. Soon the customers were laughing with us. The mood across the front became more jovial and pleasant. We were now in a vinegar comradery. Finally, the mess was cleaned up and it was work as usual with a faint stench.

Plain and simple: you have to make the best of what life throws at you, even when it’s spilled vinegar.

“A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones.” Proverbs 17:22 (KJV)

That was the last time I saw so much vinegar displayed in the front of the store. I guess management learned the hard way that klutzy employees and huge glass jars don’t mix well.