Name: Ryan Loredo
Age: 23
Year: Alumni
Major: Anthropology and History
Where is your hometown?
I moved a lot when I was a kid. The west is my home; my culture and perspective always have that skew. My hometown where I molded my childhood with that perspective was Keene NH. It was a place where the two extremes met and left little ground for middle perspectives to take hold. I never felt safe in that city but I loved that excitement because I hate a boring life. It was good though; conflict and forge make a strong person.
Why did you choose VCU?
I chose VCU out of several other colleges that had a journalism and anthropology department. I was a journalist at the time and wanted to be an investigative reporter before becoming interested in intellectual history. I narrowed the list down to two colleges that were the same and flipped a coin with heads landing for VCU. The other college was NMSU. Never could stop me. I constantly took on challenges physically, mentally, academically and otherwise to find out who I am. I had just gotten out of a bad four year relationship and did everything I could come across to find out who I am as a single person. I went from being a Christian to an atheist, a fat self loathing man into a man who is obsessed with the gym, and from a man who did not engage in debates to one who challenges and learns with others from all and any perspectives.
Now that you’ve graduated, what’s next for you?
I am a Research Assistant with the forensics department and boosting up my resume for grad school. I have applied to several jobs in the field that I find and hopefully I get into a program or job.
What was your biggest accomplishment in your undergrad years?
There isn’t one that trumps another in some form of significance. My undergraduate career was filled with triumphs and tribulations from classes, projects, taking charge of organizations, volunteering, hooking up with people, relationships that broke me, victories over mental health issues like suicide and body image issues. The biggest one in a campy sense has to be a theme of helping whoever I could in what I could justify as a better experience but really it was surviving with everything I had without regrets in terms of realizing what comprises me is my past.
What advice would you give yourself four years ago?
I would say nothing to myself years ago. I was a huge idiot at times and wish I acted better in some situations but if I gave myself advice I would never learn from my mistake or worse: never have a story to tell.
What’s your biggest inspiration?
I have no inspiration or heroes other than to make my day one I am proud of in a life I see fit. I don’t think of my future as an agenda set to one path but rather if I will use my left, right, or bike to get around. Sure, I would like to have a family, the ability to travel and adventure around both in and out of my career, gain a really great healthy body, pilot a giant mech, and all that jazz but I think if you set yourself up to a big vision of the future by only thinking of what is wanted you miss out what you have to do in the present which is the only guaranteed time.
What’s got you excited about the future?
I think the most exciting thing about the future is the ability for humans and society to change and how we will cope with change. Will we change for prosperity, ego, pride, sex, profit, or something yet to be defined?
How do you unwind and relax?
I like to read and relax mostly, but I also work out like nothing else.