A girl with her whole high school career ahead of her.

Usually spending her time painting and exploring music, Alison Ely is one who often chooses the creative path. 

“I choose it over other things because it’s a way to express yourself, especially painting and art and stuff like that and I’ve leaned more towards that as I grew up especially when I was younger,” Ely said.

With her entrance to Puyallup High School, she has chosen her electives based on her artistic interests.

“[In] junior high I didn’t have a chance to [take an art class] because I was taking my Spanish elective but this year I’m taking drawing. Hopefully next year I’ll go into painting,” Ely said. “[My interest in] painting is actually pretty recent, about two years ago, but I have drawn since I was in third or fourth grade.

Despite the joy of a fresh piece of original art, Ely enjoys the process just as much.

“I enjoy making the art, I enjoy finishing it and feeling like this is my finished product and it’s really good but I also like the fact that it’s relaxing and it’s nice and simple to do,” Ely said. “It can go by fast. I think painting is my favorite medium because there’s so much you can do with it, there’s so much you can create.”

Beside sketching and painting, Ely also likes to occupy herself by grouping songs together to create playlists.

“I usually try to organize them by mood. I have different playlists for different things,” Ely said. “I have about three right now and I’m still working on them. I usually try to work on them whenever I have downtime.”

Despite her variety of playlists, Ely, like all of us has a sound she prefers of others.

“Not exactly mainstream, but kind of pop-ish. Somewhere in the middle,” Ely said. “A lot of mainstream stuff is overplayed and then it gets old really fast but there’s a few bands, like The Band Camino, they’re kind of an instrumental band. I like something that’s catchy but that also has kind of an acoustic feel to it and good vocals.”

Regardless of her creative passions, she would rather explore something under the umbrella of biology for her future occupation.

“I would love to [study art] but the options are limited when it comes to that type of stuff. I’m probably going to end up keeping it as a hobby,” Ely said. “I wish there were more art-related options other than graphic design for a job because it doesn’t sound like the best option for me.”