上一代的苦，不必再傳下去
紅沒藥的屬名是 Commiphora，意思只是「會流樹膠的樹」，與甜苦無關。這一群樹流出來的樹脂被人統稱為沒藥，而沒藥這個字的字根，在希伯來語與阿拉伯語裡就是苦。叫得久了，苦就成了這一家人的名字。
但紅沒藥身上一直還有另一個名字：甜沒藥，兩個到今日都在用。前面那個記住它屬於哪一家，後面那個則表達了它是甚麼味道。而它自己那個名字裡，仍然帶著沒藥兩個字。
它長在索馬里與埃塞俄比亞一帶的旱地上，一年幾乎不下雨，只肯長在石膏土上，那是家族裡條件最差的一塊地。
紅沒藥的氣味很溫暖，前段是帶著淡淡蜜意的香脂感，隨時間底下的乾燥泥土感慢慢滲出來，餘下一點近似舊煙草的香氣。完全沒有一般沒藥那種苦的氣息。或許這個家族的苦，去到紅沒藥這裡，就停住了。
家庭裡可能有很多一代一代傳下來的信念與行為，有時會讓我們感到有點苦。但其實，長輩傳下來的不是苦，而是他們當年只有這一套行事方式，相信那是唯一可行的方法，於是就這樣交到你手上。
那不是惡意，那是他們僅有的東西。
你可以明白他們只會那一套，同時不把那一套接過來。
就如紅沒藥一樣，家族的苦，到你這裡可以不再傳下去。
以香為語，安在當下。
𝘽𝙚 𝙋𝙧𝙚𝙨𝙚𝙣𝙩, 𝙩𝙝𝙧𝙤𝙪𝙜𝙝 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙡𝙖𝙣𝙜𝙪𝙖𝙜𝙚 𝙤𝙛 𝙨𝙘𝙚𝙣𝙩.
The bitterness stops with you.
Opopanax belongs to the genus Commiphora, a name that means no more than gum-bearing and has nothing to do with sweet or bitter. The resins of these trees came in time to be called myrrh, and the root of that word, in Hebrew and in Arabic, means bitter. Called that for long enough, bitterness became the name of the whole family.
Yet it has carried a second name all along: sweet myrrh. Both are still in use. The first remembers which family it belongs to; the second tells you what it actually smells of. And inside that second name, the word myrrh is still there.
It grows across the drylands of Somalia and Ethiopia, where a year goes by with almost no rain, and it will root only in gypsum soil. That is the poorest piece of ground in the family.
The scent of opopanax is warm. It opens balsamic, with a faint honeyed edge, and as time passes a dry earthiness seeps up from underneath, leaving behind something close to old tobacco. Of the bitterness one expects of myrrh there is none at all. Perhaps the bitterness of this family came as far as opopanax, and stopped.
A family may hold any number of beliefs and habits passed down through the generations, and at times they leave a bitter taste. What the elders handed on, though, was not the bitterness. It was the one way of doing things they had, which they believed to be the only way that worked, and so it came into your hands just as it was.
There was no ill will in it. It was all they had.
You can understand that it was the only way they knew, and still not take it up.
Like opopanax, the bitterness of a family need go no further than you.
Grounded in the present, spoken through scent.
𝘽𝙚 𝙋𝙧𝙚𝙨𝙚𝙣𝙩, 𝙩𝙝𝙧𝙤𝙪𝙜𝙝 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙡𝙖𝙣𝙜𝙪𝙖𝙜𝙚 𝙤𝙛 𝙨𝙘𝙚𝙣𝙩.