I moved to Philadelphia to write.

At first, I knew no one.

I couldn’t tune out the noise, but I felt very alone. The world outside illuminated a shared soundscape: the low-flying plane outside of our building, the lurch of the trash truck in the early morning, a woman singing.

I came from a place of rolling hills where life moved to the clattering of horse and buggies twisting round back roads. On the city streets, I caught snippets of sounds in every direction. I listened to every word in phone conversations on my commutes and overheard conversations in cafes. When I began to work as a coffee barista in a bustling indoor marketplace, I listened to the stories of my coworkers and customers. I began to like how the sounds overlapped, in conversation with one another.

While studying Creative Writing, I felt drawn to explore themes of loneliness and belonging in my work.

I wanted to understand how listening to stories makes us human.

After graduation, I began working at a contemporary art museum. I spent a lot of time in the galleries discussing artistic concepts, but I felt most alive when I had the opportunity to work on a radio segment: a collaboration between Philadelphia Contemporary and The Fabric Workshop and Museum (FWM) celebrating the work of Jonathan Lyndon Chase.

I realized how much I loved audio storytelling. Soon, I left the art museum to begin an apprenticeship with a podcast called Shelter in Place.

Throughout the pandemic, I found rituals of rest to be grounding and restorative. During my apprenticeship, I created an episode exploring why our world needs more rest through the lens of a Shabbat practice. As an audio apprentice, I learned how to create emotional landscapes with words and sounds, and knew that I wanted to continue sharing stories with the world.

Today, I’m a freelance writer & audio producer asking the same question: What does it mean to be human?

Education

I received my MFA in creative writing from Temple University and my B.A. in English literature with a minor in print media studies from Millersville University.