1994-2015: Old Virginia!
My passion for engineering and building comes from humble beginnings: my part-time college job as a Jimmy John’s delivery biker in Charlottesville, Virginia.
The delivery job prompted me to buy my first real bike, a 2009 Tommaso Monza. By the time I resold the bike in 2019, I’d replaced every single part, recovered the bike from thieves twice, rode it across the American South, pulled 10,000 city miles, and managed to not get hit by a single car!
Fun fact: I’m a dedicated writer of science-fiction and fantasy novels. In May 2024, I was honored with a grant from Boston’s GrubStreet to attend the nationally renowned Muse & The Marketplace convention, where I went to craft workshops, pitched my novel to agents, and rubbed elbows from authors from around the world. Incredible weekend!
2016-2019: The Mountain Woman Years
After college, I moved to Salt Lake City to train as an alpinist. I taught myself to powder ski and picked up trad, aid, and ice climbing in the canyons of Little Cottonwood.
In 2017, I earned a professional guide certification from the American Mountain Guides Association. For three seasons, I directed a climbing program in the Pisgah Forest of Western North Carolina, 40 minutes south of Asheville. On the off-seasons, I climbed beautiful Utah granite and sandstone, skied at Alta Resort, and built and rode bikes in the valley.
Fun fact: I love adventure travel! Here I am on the solo trek of a lifetime, the Three High Passes Route to Everest base camp in December 2018. I can’t say enough great things about the Khumbu region and the lovely people of Nepal!
2020-2022: The Midwestern Days
I moved to Madison, Wisconsin in 2019 to help a friend recover from personal tragedy. At this point, I knew I wanted to be an engineer. My plan was to take classes at the University of Wisconsin to prepare for graduate school. I didn’t anticipate the COVID-19 pandemic.
Fortunately, while the guide work dried up, the bicycle industry exploded. I worked two busy, busy years as a sales associate and mechanic at Machinery Row Bicycles, the biggest bicycle retailer in Madison. In my free time, I took core classes in math and engineering at Madison Area Technical College. Eventually, I gained enough credits for acceptance to my dream Mechanical Engineering program: LEAP at Boston University.
Above Image: A small fleet of Giant Contends lovingly built by me!
My friends and I at our last Engineering Pub Night together at BU.
LEAP! Late Entry Accelerated Program: 2022-Present
In August 2022, I moved to Boston for graduate school. My program, LEAP, allows promising students without engineering bachelor’s degrees to work toward a master’s degree in engineering without having to get a second bachelor’s. My cohort holds degrees in applied math, anthropology, human development, and many more subjects besides that.
The past two years of grad school have been some of the best of my life. I love my work and I look forward to a long, productive career as a mechanical engineer!
College Part 2: Still Biking!