Midnight on a hot, summer night. I step out of my bedroom and everything inside the house exudes its sweet, unique scent in the cloying heat: paper from books and notebooks, the residue of oil from aromatherapy lamps, sandalwood from Chinese altar statues, perfume from orchids and their leaves on a side porch, rose and white magnolia joss sticks in burners, leather, polished brass, a hint of detergent. All of these are voices, olfactory voices if you will, each one reciting stories and memories of their histories and of the joy they are brimming with just to be in your house with you and your family.