I wandered through a used bookstore where the smell enveloped me like a blanket. Surrounded by stacks of books so tall that ladders were needed to reach the tops. Shelves overflowing, unsorted piles, row upon row upon row. All of those books had been opened and all of them read. So many fingers turning so many pages filling so many minds. For every impression left, a scent absorbed. Oils, perfumes, animals, foods. Different papers, different inks, making different smells as they age. All those odors mingling into something categorically similar. Knowledge. The cumulative smell of past and present lives.