For the past few days, I have been sick with a flu, and I have had all the usual symptoms: headache, fever, runny eyes, runny nose, a cough. One day, while the unraked leaves beckoned as well as many other projects, I just lay on the couch, listening to Public Radio. I like Public Radio as much as the next person, but lying around all day drives me nuts. While in the usual course of a day I have plenty of quiet time—for reading and writing—I also have quite a bit of active time for chores and exercise, and that’s exactly how I like it.

But the thing that bothered me the most was losing my sense of smell and taste, which always happens when I have a cold or the flu, and even though I have come to expect this loss, I still dread it. It seems strange, I know, to mind not having a sense of taste or smell when the head is pounding and the eyes and nose are running none-stop, but I do.

Ever since I can remember, I have had a very keen sense of smell and taste, and I can smell things that my husband, Clif, can only dream of. One day, quite a few years ago, we were in Boston, having lunch at Quincy Market. As we ate, I picked up a strong smell, the smell of a horse. In Boston? In Quincy Market?

“Clif,” I said, “You’re going to think I’m crazy, but I smell a horse.”

I expected him to agree that I was indeed crazy, but instead he smiled and shook his head.

“What?” I asked.

“Look behind you.”

And there, a block or so away, was indeed a horse with a police officer.

Was Clif, who can hardly smell a thing, impressed? You bet he was.

My world is as much defined by smell and taste as it is by sight and hearing. When taste and smell are gone, I feel a little unmoored, unable to translate the world in my accustomed way. Something dear and essential is missing.

Each time this happens, I always think, “What if I never get my sense of taste and smell back? What if I’m like this for the rest of my life?”

What a horrible thing it would be. Fortunately, after a cold or flu, I have always regained these two senses, and how glad I am to have them back.

Quite rightly, we place a high value on sight and hearing, and I certainly wouldn’t want to lose either of those senses. But it seems to me that we undervalue taste and smell, and often it is only when they are gone that we realize how vital they are.

My sense of smell and taste were only gone for one day. Now when I eat toast, made from my homemade bread, I can taste the slightly sweet and nutty flavor of the whole wheat flour as well as the butter, rich and salty. My grapefruit has its wonderful tang softened by a little sugar.

I might not be completely well, but with my sense of taste and smell restored, I feel much, much better.