I’ve dabbled in many hobbies during my years. The ones that are the biggest part of my life right now include music, writing, and crochet. Read more about all of these by clicking the links below.

Since my childhood, there has always been a piano around. Since I’ve been tall enough to sit on the piano bench, music has been an important part of my life. I started on piano but soon picked up bassoon, clarinet, and saxophone, and now, my focuses are on jazz piano and avant-garde slide whistle. My study has been mostly self-directed, so I have been able to explore the areas of music that interest me most, including composing and arranging as well as performing. Music is an important way for me to express myself, pursue art, and build relationships. At Carleton, my involvement has included Symphony Band, jazz chamber groups, and jazz piano lessons, along with independent music production projects.

During my first term at Carleton, I developed the hobby of writing ridiculous things. First, it was poetry that imitated Walt Whitman while talking about squirrels. Then haikus gushing admiration for Toff, a bronze statue of a cat that stands in Carleton’s Gould Library. Finally, I arrived to satirical news articles. I started submitting my pieces to the Carletonian, and pretty soon, I was asked to be the editor of the Bald Spot, the satire section. I’m coming up on a year in that position, and through all the ups and downs of Carleton, I have relied on having a few hours a week to slide a little bit of humor into the newspaper, whether that’s through editing other contributors’ articles or writing my own.

My crochet projects have included cacti, a very soft green hat, a tiara, gauntlets, a crochet hook bandolier, hugely ineffective thimbles, and more. Though more experienced crocheters plan out patterns and try to make their projects look good, I approach crochet as a big experiment. I usually don’t have a final product in mind when I begin a piece; instead, I go stitch-by-stitch and row-by-row testing out ideas that I think would be fun. For me, that makes the creativity involved in crochet different from the creativity of music and writing, because I go into those pursuits planning an overall arc. When crocheting, I take it one step at a time.