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I met Krysten about 9 months ago, close to the beginning of 2017 when she started as an intern where I was working. My first impression? Just someone from out of state, fairly quiet, keeps to herself, but nope. This girl is the epitome of raw talent and is one of the most outgoing and hilarious people that I know (don't even get us started on puns).
Not only did she complete high school by the age of 16 (home schooled & passed the graduation exam), she released a couple original songs on iTunes and developed a following as a singer songwriter. She wasn't even 16 years old - what's your excuse?
One of my favorite memories with Krysten is actually one that's quite recent to the time I'm writing this. She began pursuing a career in music full-time a couple months ago and shared a story with me on one of her visits to my office.
"So I'm in LA around 6 and I'm trying to find a parking spot, so I park in front of the studio to get a pretty good spot, but it says until 6 o'clock. So here I am with my pepper spray, going around the building to the back to see if there's a parking spot there. I go in the back and there are security people around this group of guys and I'm weirded out already.
So I ask them and I was like, 'is there a parking spot that I can use? Because the parking thing says it's 'til 6 and I have to be here 'til 7?'
They're like, 'no, that just means after 6 it's free parking.'
So I was like, oh perfect! So I walk back around with my pepper spray and I go get peppermint tea from the place next door. I get the peppermint tea and go back to my car to get my music stuff out and I (uhm) spilled my tea all over the place.
I didn't have a case for my electric guitar, so I wrapped it around my back. And so, I'm walking with my bin on my floor pad and everything (except for the tea) and electric guitar. My hair gets caught in my electric guitar so I ask the guy in front to help me get my hair out of my electric guitar. Then my electric guitar drops because it slides off my strap and falls down on the ground. (Audible sighs of sadness)
So I go downstairs to the room we're in - room 2 - and I go down the stairs and I drop my bin and so the floor pad...the plug for the floor pad breaks, battery juice starts leaking out of the floor pad, and then the sound in the studio wasn't working like half the time, and my voice is like shot because I have so much congestion in my nasal cavities and my throat, and I couldn't sing (more audible sighs of sadness).
And so basically, I just rocked the electric guitar and they decided to have me for electric guitar instead of someone else. So that's good, but at the same time, like, it was awful."
Of course, this all sounds terrible and, in the moment, I'm sure it was. But the way Krysten spun an awful experience into a humorous anecdote was what got me. She had me and my coworkers laughing our butts off with her.
It really just goes to show that your experiences and circumstances aren't the things that get you down, it's how you choose to react and live out your life that influences your state of being.
Keep up with her journey by following her on social media! She's definitely going places.
- Calvin Chu