When did you graduate from BHS? Were you home schooled? How long? Tell me what you remember about switching to public school.
I graduated from Bluffton High School in 2007. A strange man came to school attempting to capitalize on the "007" year by selling us James Bond themed senior t-shirts. I abstained.
My grandfather, retired chemist and all-around expert Dick Weaver, homeschooled my siblings, a handful of cousins, and me. With him I spent most of my time building bird feeders and puppet theaters, visiting museums, writing short stories, and going on treasure hunts. Somehow I managed to learn things by doing all this. I entered Bluffton schools in fourth grade but my first public school experience was the year before, when my mom took a sabbatical to teach in Nicaragua and hauled the whole family along. My Spanish vocabulary as I began at a public Catholic school consisted of the words for "Hello" and "I need o to use the bathroom." I used both phrases my first day.
You were involved in some theater in high school. What was your favorite acting role? What would you like to do, acting-wise? Have you done that in college? How so?
Although I played quite a variety of colorful characters throughout high school, my favorite role was in a one-act we did in the fall of my sophomore year, in which I played the bogeyman, trying in vain to train his young and clueless apprentice, played by Joel Reichenbach. I had a blast developing a chemistry with Joel that I think the audience appreciated as well.
I have had one theatrical role in college; my freshman year I had a small role as a member of a troupe of actors in Tom Stoppard's absurdist Hamlet send-up "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead." I got to climb out of a barrel while toting my euphonium, and I got dramatic death scene. What more could one want?
Any other extracurricular activities?
In high school I played in the marching, concert, and jazz band. I was on the academic team when, my junior year, we competed on the state level; my senior year we lost the Northwest Conference title for the first time in nine years. I understand they have never quite recovered since. Sorry Juan!
At Earlham I have been involved in, at various times, the concert choir, madrigal singers, jazz ensemble, Rhythm Project (percussion ensemble), orchestra, gamelan (Javanese percussion) ensemble, student-run a cappella group, and Earlham Film Society, as well as writing for the student newspaper and working as a peer writing consultant.
Throughout all this time I've also been writing and recording
folk-rock-alternative-what-have-you music, much of which can be
downloaded or streamed at http://www.last.fm/music/Micah+Sommer.
What prank would you like to admit to having done while living in Bluffton? Any other interesting stories?
I wish I could say I was the deviant type in my youth. Alas, I have precious few stories of delinquency. Once, on a school- or
church-sponsored trip to Suter's corn maze, I was caught answering the call of nature and was forcibly expelled from the maze. That was embarrassing.
What is the worst grade you ever received? Why? What did your parents say?
My parents have always been very supportive of my academic pursuits. Any low grades I've received have been fairly earned.
If you had a vanity plate, what would it say? Or...if you got a tattoo, what would it be?
A vanity plate would first require an automobile, and I'm far too indecisive for tattoos.
So...now you're what year at Earlham? What's your major?
I am in fact a senior-to-be at Earlham, just across the state line in Richmond, Indiana. I am majoring in music with a focus on composition and choral conducting. I am also minoring in journalism.
You're spending the summer as an intern at the Richmond Palladium-Item, AKA Pal-Item. What was your first story? I noticed you wrote one about some hairstylists collecting hair clippings for use in cleaning up the Gulf oil spill. What was that all about?
Sadly, the Gulf clean-up folks have rejected using hair to clean up the oil spill, citing its apparent impracticality. I saw the YouTube demos though, and I was impressed. That was the first story I wrote, but the first that was published was coverage of Tony Hoard, a dog trainer, and his canine companions performing flying disc tricks for a group of elementary schoolers. Tony and his Australian shepherd Rory remain the only animal act to have advanced to the top 20 in America's Got Talent.
What is the best book you've ever read? Anything on your reading list for this summer?
The series I generally recommend to everyone I meet is Dan Simmons's Hyperion Cantos, which weaves together space travel, time travel, revisionist Christian mythology, robot violence, Zen Buddhism, and Romantic poetry. It's a wild ride. I'm currently reading 2666 by Roberto Bola~no, a 900-page epic set on the US-M'exico border. Next on my list are The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon, and Queering the Pitch: The New Gay and Lesbian Musicology. Meanwhile I spend a fair amount of time reading the New York Times online and a wide variety of blogs.
Will you do some sort of study abroad during college?
I spent the spring 2009 semester in M'exico studying the intersections of global and local forces in small communities. It essentially consisted of four months being very angry about garbage dumps and soft drink companies and government violence and bottled water and pesticides and trade agreements. I also wrote some highly mediocre songs, in Spanish, about the aforementioned topics.
Any ideas of what you'd like to do after college? Aspirations?
The job prospects in the two fields of study I've chosen to focus on aren't exactly glowing. Given my family history and personal inclinations, the specter of graduate school looms omnipresent, but I'd like to keep my options open. If you're a civic organization who needs someone to direct your choir and write your press releases, I just might be the guy for you.
