{"id":123,"date":"2022-05-12T16:09:04","date_gmt":"2022-05-12T20:09:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/?p=123"},"modified":"2022-05-20T15:05:13","modified_gmt":"2022-05-20T19:05:13","slug":"jack-of-all-trades-master-of-heart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/jack-of-all-trades-master-of-heart\/","title":{"rendered":"Jack of all Trades, Master of Heart"},"content":{"rendered":"
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by Saffron Hefta-Gaub ’22<\/em><\/h1>\n<\/header>\n
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Note: Quin uses any pronouns and so I will be alternating my use of \u201che,\u201d \u201cthey,\u201d and \u201cshe\u201d throughout the piece.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve known Quin for a couple of years now, but always framed in a Zoom or Discord window, headphones on, yellow-gold walls behind him. We\u2019ve gotten to know each other in online fandom spaces.\u00a0 We’ve been playing the roleplaying game Monsterhearts with a group of friends for almost a year now, but we\u2019ve never talked in depth about our lives. Given the opportunity to interview Quin for this project, I was excited to finally get to learn more. Now I know that Quin has known those walls for as long they can remember, having lived in the same house for 22 years.<\/p>\n

Quin has curly, dark hair, glasses, an even voice, and a full-bodied laugh. She is a self-described jack of all trades, finding time to play video games, tabletop roleplaying games, and classical guitar, when not busy as a junior chemistry major. Despite being busy, they legitimately like all of the things that they do. She finds fulfillment in academic success and hopes to help publish a well-renowned research paper one day.<\/p>\n

Born to first-generation Russian immigrants, growing up in the suburbs of Chicago, Quin always thought he would have a future in the field of chemistry. Her parents are both paints chemists and he expected to follow in their footsteps. Early on, Quin was labeled a gifted kid, until their sophomore year of high school hit, and they cracked under the pressure. He was failing the class that had always been their focus: chemistry. Despite the falter of confidence, through the support of a beloved teacher, Quin found a love for chemistry outside of completing homework assignments, through an honest discussion of theory. When she enrolled in the University of Illinois, the subject matter wasn\u2019t difficult, but the workload was overwhelming, and Quin struggled once again. Now, they\u2019ve moved back home and are thinking about future careers where they can enjoy practicing what they\u2019ve learned. After rambling to me about paint chemistry and particle accelerators, Quin jokes, \u201cThat\u2019s what I love about science, it\u2019s just like \u2018Fuck it, why not?\u2019\u201d I\u2019d say the same attitude goes for choosing jobs that bring you joy.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, Quin gains fulfillment in seeing other people succeed. Quin tells me they want to be seen as approachable, that \u201cAs someone who\u2019s been seen as abrasive, annoying [in the past], I would love to just been seen as someone who is open and can be talked to.\u201d I\u2019m glad, then, that I had the opportunity to talk to Quin, and I plan to reach out and talk with them again soon.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Saffron Hefta-Gaub ’22 Note: Quin uses any pronouns and so I will be alternating my use of \u201che,\u201d \u201cthey,\u201d and \u201cshe\u201d throughout the piece. I\u2019ve known Quin for a couple of years now, but always framed in a Zoom or Discord window, headphones on, yellow-gold walls behind him. We\u2019ve gotten to know each other…Read more Jack of all Trades, Master of Heart<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3782,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nonfiction-profiles"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3782"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=123"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":513,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123\/revisions\/513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/writers-on-writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}