From the Editors June 2022

A profile of our Copy Editor Maya Kilmer

Maya is still new to to stone carving world, having only been able to attend two summer symposiums. She immediately fell in love with the community of artists at Pilgrim Firs. Back in her real life, Maya is a high school teacher of English and pottery, and as any other teachers know, that is pretty life-consuming for 10 months of the year. The end of this school year will conclude her 21st year in education. She was lucky to have always been encouraged in art, and she loves ceramics, photography, and painting. She also loves the outdoors, including snowboarding, skiing, mountaineering, hiking, and horseback riding. Early on in the pandemic, her husband was diagnosed with an aggressive cancer, and they spent a third of that fall staying in the UW Medical Center’s oncology ward for an equally-aggressive treatment. Luckily, her husband survived, and while they are both still teaching in PAPR respirators due to his suppressed immune system, Maya was, for the first time in her life, forced to learn how to truly take one day at a time, which has changed her whole approach to life for the better. While she is unsure of whether her husband will be healthy enough for her to attend this summer’s camp, she misses the wonderful camaraderie and can’t wait to see everyone again.
~ Maya