I was born and raised in Washington state, and after graduating from high school in 1998, took the slower route to college, via community college.
After high school, I got my associate’s degree in 2001 and went on to transfer to the University of Washington, in Seattle. There, I got my BFA in Fine Arts, Painting and Drawing.
Coming from a family of many military members, it seemed unorthodox that I chose a fine arts degree, and even more unorthodox after graduating in 2004 to join the Marine Corps, commissioning in 2005 as a 2nd Lieutenant, and training as a logistics officer.
In the Marines I served in the Persian Gulf and Afghanistan, seeing parts of the world many would never have considered, or will ever see, and that opened my eyes up to the possibilities that academia held for me.
In 2009, at the end of my contract, I returned to school, and found myself in Louisville, pursuing a BA in art history. Originally, I intended to study modern art, as that was my passion at UW, however, I was quickly hooked on medieval Middle Eastern and Central Asian art, no doubt inspired and encouraged by my encounters during my time deployed.
Regardless, after 2 years at UofL I had a BA in art history, a minor in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies, and a Fulbright fellowship to teach English in Oman, and the rest, well, is not so much history, but still in the works.
I am currently a Learning and Interpretation Fellow and Curatorial Intern in the Arts of the Islamic World department at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston (for all of the summer of 2016), and following that I will be beginning a PhD program in archaeology at Washington University in St. Louis at the end of August. I will be focusing on Central Asian ceramics, specifically those from a medieval Islamic site in Uzbekistan I’ve been digging at with a WashU team.