PHS MEDIA NEWS

Eighth grader Chloe Korsmo has had an interest in horses since a young age. She has known how to ride a horse since she was five years old.

“I have had a passion for horses ever since I was little. My aunt has two horses I have known and loved since I was a baby. I started taking lessons when I was five, and I absolutely fell in love. Ever since then, I have had a need to always be on a horse,” said Korsmo.

Korsmo started training horses since she was 11 years old. She works with a barn that buys, retrains and sells horses. She mainly trains horses to jump, but she can help with any type of training. A normal day for Korsmo is going straight to work after coming home from school. She gets a list of which horses needs what kind of training. Then, she tacks up and heads down to the arena to get to work.

“I mostly do jumping if they need a horse to be trained to jump because I am the smallest rider, and I have the most experience in jumping. Sometimes, if the horse needs trail experience, we will go out on their trails,” said Korsmo.

Korsmo had to make a lot of adjustments after moving to Indiana. In California, where she used to live, there were more English horses to train than in Indiana.

“Since I moved here, things have been tremendously different in the horse world. There are not nearly as many English barns around here as there were in California. The barns are also a lot more laid back, and there are less rules. I’m riding far less English and jumper than I used to,” said Korsmo.

Korsmo is wanting to make a career out of working with horses. She wants to go to Ohio State University to get a degree in equine business and become a large animal veterinarian. Working with horses has had a huge impact on Korsmo’s life. She has learned many skills from working with horses.

“Working with horses has taught me patience, improved my work ethic and greatly improved my balance. They bring happiness and satisfaction when they finally click with something I’ve been trying to teach them for a while. I will definitely continue to work with horses. It pays well, and I enjoy doing it very much,” said Korsmo.

 

Story by Angie Ceja

Sophomore Gracie Collins enjoys writing songs in her free time. Collins has been interested in music since she was young, and her mom inspired her to take the next step to begin writing music.

“[My mom] was in a band, writes songs, sings and plays instruments,” said Collins.

After learning music from her mom, Collins fell in love with it. She enjoys both music and songwriting because of how many possibilities there are.

“You can turn whatever you’re thinking in your mind into a song. I love to be able to get my point of view across with my music,” said Collins.

Collins has written six original songs but has others she either has not finished or doesn’t like. Collins has performed one original song as well as covers. Her favorite songs to cover are “Riptide” by Vance Joy and “Smells like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana. She was nervous to perform for the first time, but she enjoyed the experience. Collins first performed at Paoli Fest in 2018.

“My favorite thing about performing my songs is everything. I don’t have a least favorite thing about performing, but the first time you perform is very nerve-racking,” said Collins.

All of her songs include some kind of instrument. She first taught herself how to play the guitar, but she can now play the guitar, ukulele and some piano. She looks to her mom for advice on songwriting, and she looks to bands for inspiration.

“The bands that inspire me the most are basically punk rock bands; they just have so many thoughts and feelings that are put into their songs, which I try to do with my own songs,” said Collins.

Collins’s advice for someone who wants to get into songwriting is to persevere, even if it gets frustrating or seems hopeless. Collins thinks everyone can connect and fall in love with music just as she did.

“There are no rules with music, you can do whatever you want with it, and no one can tell you it is wrong. I connect with it, and there isn’t much more I feel as connected with as I do with music,” said Collins.

 

Story by Faith Wilder