After UNC and Chapel Hill my mother and I moved to Melbourne, Australia when I was five. My Nonno (grandfather) needed us and his daughter (my mother) was all the way in North Carolina. Mom and I went. Dad stayed behind to finish university.

I attended an all boys school in Melbourne, Australia. Right down there in that small crevice all the way south. Why we didn’t move to Adelaide, where Nonno was? I’m not sure. I enjoyed my time in Melbourne though, I was inducted into a new culture of swearing in every sentence, barbecues in the rain, squid fishing and kangaroo racing. My Mom and I lived there for four years where I attended first through third grade.

It’s weird. When it’s summer in America it’s winter in Australia. So the typical “summer-break” happens over Christmas and the American “summer-break” is all rainy for us. Dad would visit us occasionally.

When it was time to move back to the States, my Dad joined us in Melbourne, helped us pack, and shipped us off to Palo Alto, California, tucked in the Bay Area of San Francisco. This is what I truly recognize as my home. The Bay Area was a big change for me. I still had my Australian accent, my love of sausage-rolls and disdain for the lack of them in the States, and it was just me, my Mom, and my Dad.

We looked at the schools around us and decided it best to go to Sacred Heart Preparatory in Atherton, California. On financial aid and hopes of a higher education, I remained at SHP until I graduated high school. It was a Catholic school, however, there was an expectation of open-mindedness. We learned about Buddhism and Paganism, we were taught prayer rites of other religions and had Wednesday “Espacios,” where a student or guest speaker would speak to the school about their personal experiences. I loved SHP.

Born and raised in Chapel Hill, NC until I was four. I grew up with my two parents, both graduates of UNC Chapel Hill and effectively was indoctrinated into the Tarheel world. I don’t remember much of my infancy but I certainly laughed a lot. This is where I get my love of basketball from. I’ve played basketball since I can remember and I started coaching around sixteen. At one point, I pursued the basketball coach career. That led me to where I am today. More on that later.

My next chapter took me to UC Boulder in Colorado. I entered the pre-business school. MISTAKE. I don’t know why I thought that I could do math, my high school record told me I couldn’t. But I took the business school route anyways. Why? Not sure. I took on the sports-management minor, that might bring me closer to my dreams of becoming an NCAA coach. Maybe I’ll get a job working for the basketball team? Maybe not.

After flopping out of the pre-business school, yes, PRE-business, I started a Communications major. I took the general education classes and enjoyed what I was learning. If I learn effective communication and the psychological effects of communication, I should be able to effectively communicate to my players. Right?

I stuck with that for a while. A hobby distracted me though. For some reason, I couldn’t stop cooking. I simply could not stop. I was cooking every night, thinking of new things to make with my college-kid budget. It was the thing I looked forward to the most in the day. This took me to Appalachian State.

It was when I graduated to the high school of SHP that I found my passion for literature, and more specifically, writing. The teachers and faculty pushed me to be the best writer I could be. Dr. Lisa Harper and Mr. Daniel Kennedy were my main mentors and I shared everything from songs I wrote, poems, short stories, and simple analytical ideas about literature from the class with them. It was in Dr. Harper’s class where I started “How Evil Was Created.”

The rest of my time at SHP was dedicated to my studies, basketball, and writing. I became the assistant coach of the varsity team senior year after spending a year as the team manager. I was involved in half-time discussions, pre-game and practice planning and in-game strategy. I felt like I wanted to be an NCAA basketball coach, but the real passion was hidden far underneath.

I applied and got into Appalachian State in 2020 and transferred from UC Boulder in the middle of the school year. I remember it was winter-break and my Dad had just helped me move into my studio apartment, when COVID hit. I was only two or three weeks into my first semester in the Communications major and I was forced to sequester myself to my tiny apartment and all my classes converted to an online format. The hobby I picked up in Boulder crept back and I was cooking all three meals a day for myself. I found a sort of therapy and meditation in creating dishes. Finding ways to combine different ingredients to create a dish with different and amazing flavors than the last.

When I flew back home to California for the remainder of the lockdown, my hobby came with me. Here, I was around family and friends, people I knew. At App State I was new, barely knew anyone, but now, I could share my gift with people. I saw the smiles on people’s faces after hours in the kitchen. I was now a determined aspiring chef, basketball was in the past. I could tell a story with my food, I could create something that makes people feel something. That’s all I wanted out of cooking. I wanted to make people happy with something I created.

Unfortunately, the college life caught up to me and financially I couldn’t continue to feed myself the way I had been. My classes were picking up and I had transferred into the Electronic Media Broadcasting focus of my Communications major. I was part of 2021’s select number of students admitted into the EM/B school. Focused on the electronic aspect of writing, producing and creating content, mainly for news sources, I started gathering skills that would hone my ability to tell stories. That is the underlying passion in everything I’ve done. As a coach, I have a story to tell, I tell it to my players, and I listen to their stories. Together we succeed when the story is executed correctly and our score is higher than the opponent’s. When I cook, I cook to make people feel something. I put energy and love into the food I cook and I want the people eating it to feel that and appreciate it and enjoy themselves through my creation. As a journalist I get to tell other people’s stories. I get to do research and share stories that may never have otherwise been shared with the world.

Then, I added an English major. I realize now that a double major is a death sentence. I wouldn’t recommend it and I’m certainly up late most nights. My English major has a Creative Writing focus and that, combined with my EM/B major, is a constant learning experience in story creation and production. I wouldn’t be where I am today without finding multiple passions. It’s okay to change your mind, you just can’t change it forever.