Nosy Interview: Michael Shilling

Michael in M13: The Great Globular Cluster in Hercules, © Marco Burali, Tiziano Capecchi, Marco Mancini

Michael and I have lived at the same Ann Arbor address (at different times) and in the same Seattle ZIP code (at different times) and I really hope we'll live in the same city (at the same time) again in the future. Read more about Michael and his novel, Rock Bottom, here.

What do you smell like?

I have often wondered if I have a smell native to myself. Others have strong, identifiable scents, but on the occasions when I have asked significant others what I smell like, they shrug and provide an answer that I will composite as, "I don't know. It's nice though. Except when you're mad. Then you smell weird." Me, I think I smell like grass, broad lush expanses of it, English country lawns that act as verdant moats to bare ruined estates, preferably haunted. I also probably smell a little like a cat, because two cats sleep on me every night. PS Cats smell great.

What do you like to smell?

I like vetiver, bay rum, vanilla, and sandalwood. There's my inner hippie at it again. I also like the smell of gasoline, a BBQ pit, coffee, donuts, and laundromats, which brings to mind one of my favorite poems about smell, though it may not be particularly smell-forward, which is Richard Wilbur's "Love Calls Us to the Things of This World." What a poem! And since you didn't ask, I hate the smell of licorice, and the taste of it, too. Licorice . . . The Devil's Breath.