Macey LeBlanc

The subject I conducted this interview with is actually a classmate of mine in my Religious Studies course. After our class was finished, I asked her if she would be willing to let me interview her for my blog. She agreed to do it. “I have nothing else until 2:30 today,” she informed me.

A couple minutes later we met up just outside of the Java City in Stapleton Library. After I fetched myself a cup of coffee we sat down. Just as I did with Joshua, I explained to her that she could leave at any time, and that if there was anything she’d rather I not mention to let me know.

Below is the interview. As I did with Joshua, I made sure to start off with some easy questions to make sure she was comfortable.

“What is your name?”

“Macey LeBlanc,” she responded.

“What is your major?”

“Pre-Vet.”

I looked up from my note-taking. “Pre-Vet?” I asked to make sure I heard her right. “Not Pre-Med?” 

For a moment I thought about how coincidental it would have been if the first two people I interviewed were both Pre-Med majors. To explain to her why I wanted to make sure I was clear, I told her that my previous interview had been with a Pre-Med major.

She laughed. “I actually do have people ask me what a Pre-Vet is,” Macey told me. “I’ll tell them my major and they’ll ask, ‘Is that Pre-Veteran?’ I’ll tell them, ‘Nope. Pre-Veterinarian.’”

I chuckled as I moved on to the next question. “What year are you?”

“I’m a second semester freshman.”

“Both in your college career and I.U.P?” I asked.

“Yes, that’s correct.”

“Where are you from?”

“My house is in New Jersey, however I’m from Louisiana.”

“Where in New Jersey?”

“My house is in Howell. However I lived in a couple of places before that. I move around a lot.”

Immediately I was curious about all the places where she had lived, but I refrained from diving right into those questions. I still wanted to make sure she was comfortable talking to me. So I went on and asked, “Do you have any hobbies or interests?”

“I love animals,” she told me without a moment’s pause. Just from the way she said those words I could tell she was passionate about them. “I actually used to train alpacas.”

I raised my eyebrows “Train alpacas?” I asked to make sure I heard her correctly.

“Yeah. It was fun” she told me. “Before that I trained dogs. However, my dog is a dachshund and he was really stubborn. I said, ‘This is way too difficult. I’m going to switch to alpacas instead.” I wondered why someone would switch from training dogs to alpacas. As if she read my mind, she elaborated on her statement. “Believe it or not, alpacas are actually easier to train.”

“Really?” You could probably imagine my disbelief. “I never even knew you could train alpacas,” I admitted to her. “I know that they could be domesticated, but not that you could actually train them to do tricks. What you can you train them to do?”

“Have you ever seen a dog agility show?” Macey inquired.

“Yes,” I replied. (For those of you who don’t know, a dog agility show is basically a competition where people show how agile their dogs are by using various kinds of obstacles and performances.)

“It’s the exact same concept,” she went on.

“So they have to run around bars and stuff?”

“Yes,” she confirmed. “They also can be taught to jump over hurdles. There’s one thing you can teach them to do where you have to put a blanket over their head. Basically they have to behave with the blanket over them, and you have to back them with a lead into an open square. They get rated based on well they do. Then you walk around the ring with them and that’s basically showmanship.”

“Do they give out prize money for that like they do with dog shows?”

“I've never done it to win money. I did it through 4-H organizations. They hand out ribbons. I never won. Unfortunately I had to quit after a year because I moved. I would assume that there would be prize money in some competitions though.”

“Is there a reason- other than possibly winning a prize- why you’d train an alpaca to do those tricks?”

“Mainly just because you can. Also the shows are a form of entertainment. Alpacas are actually pretty entertaining, especially when they try to spit on you.”

“Did you ever get spit on?” I asked.

“Almost,” she laughed.

“Do you have any other hobbies?” I asked.

“I used to write a lot when I was in high school,” she told me. “Mainly love poems because I’m a sap. However I don’t do it as much anymore. I also used to be in choir, but since I’m not a music major I don’t partake in it here.”

I nodded. It was then I decided it was time to dig deeper into Macey’s story. “What do you hope to do with your degree in Pre-Vet?”

“Ideally I want to own a zoo. I would love to own a zoo. That is my life dream.”

“Are we talking like a zoo with lions, tigers and bears-“

“Oh my!” she exclaimed. Again we both laughed. “Yeah. That’s the kind of zoo I want. However, zoos are expensive to own so the likelihood of that happening isn't very high. I would settle for working at a zoo, but that’s not too likely either. I would even work at a wildlife rehab center too, but that’s mainly more volunteer rather than paid. Even if it were paid, it wouldn't likely be very good. So what I’ll likely do is work at veterinary office and volunteer at a wildlife rehab center.

“I played Zoo Tycoon so I can see how zoos can be expensive,” I said. (Those of you who ever played the game know what I’m talking about.) “Why do you think it’s not likely you’d actually be able to work in a zoo though?”

“The job isn't in high demand,” she explained. “When a person becomes a keeper, they tend to stay. It’s not very often they need another worker to be there. It’s very picky to work there and the pay isn't very good either.”

I nodded. “What made you decide to come to I.U.P?”

“I was actually dating someone for three years,” she told me. “We just broke up the Monday before Valentine’s Day. I was looking into colleges at the time he told me he was going to Wyo-Tech- which is in Blairsville. So I looked up colleges within the area that offered a pre-veterinarian degree. I got accepted into three places- and in the end I chose I.U.P.”

“Was there any other reason why you picked I.U.P?”

“I wanted to be out of New Jersey. I really don’t like it there. If I wasn’t following my boyfriend at the time I made my decision, I would have gone to Louisiana State University. They have a great Pre-Vet program down there. I chose here though because I was following him. I also like Pennsylvania because it’s basically the south of the North.”

“Why did your family move from Louisiana?” I asked her.

“Well when Hurricane Katrina hit we had to evacuate. We moved to Florida. Since then my Dad has been divorced and remarried a few times. He met this lady at his work and she lived in New Jersey. So he moved us all with her and they got married. Seven years later he got divorced and we moved again since he met someone else through work. We’re now living with her. However, he can’t marry her because they work together and if they did one of them would have to quit. However, she just had a baby. Now I have five blood related siblings and two step-siblings.”

“Cool,” I congratulated. “So you said you live with your Dad. Where does your Mom live?”

“My Mom lives in Louisiana still. Most of family- including my Dad’s side- lives down there. I’d probably live with them if I had decided to go to L.S.U. I also have cousins who attend it. However the one just graduated from there.”

My curiosity bested me on this one, not going to deny it. “Since one of the reasons why you came here to I.U.P was because of your boyfriend whom you just recently broke up with- do you think you’ll stay here or are you going to transfer to L.S.U.?”

“Oh no, I’m staying here,” she reassured. “It’s too much work to transfer. Besides, I like it here. It’s nice. Though I don’t like the snow. It’s too cold.”

“I’d imagine that being from Louisiana, you’re not used to the snow?”

“No,” she agreed. “Before I moved to New Jersey I only experienced snow once. It was a light dusting but since it was Louisiana people were freaking out- they were having trouble driving in it. We tried to have snowball fights and build snowmen but it just went wrong.”

Chuckling, I went on and asked, “What do you like about I.U.P.?”

“I like the environment. All of my professors except for one were really good. I have many friends here. I’m pretty close with my room-mate even though she and I can get on each other’s nerves. She may not always admit it, but she loves me. We have a friend who lives down the hall. We all get together and hang out. I wouldn't want to leave.”

“You said that you were best friends with your room-mate, did you know each other beforehand? Did the two of you meet here? Was it an instant friendship or did it just gradually develop?”

“It was instant because we’re a lot alike. We were texting before we moved in and the one time she says to me, ‘Just so you know, all my friends like to describe me as a sarcastic asshole.’ I texted her back saying, ‘That’s how my friends like to describe me too!’ So we moved in, hit it off. We started to get on each other’s nerves a bit but that’s because we live with each other. We’re still good friends though, I think it’s just because it’s hard to live together with someone.”

“Where do you see yourself five to ten years from now?”

“In five years I will hopefully be in a veterinary school. In ten years hopefully working at maybe a vet. I don’t look at long-term usually. That’s the extent of how far I’ll look. I’m not the kind of person who looks too far. I don’t do it because then there’s false hopes. So I don’t do it.”

“Would you say that your life’s outlook is to not look long-term? To focus on the here and the now?”

“Yes. Sometimes it can get me in some issues. But I’m kind of spontaneous.”

“You love spontaneous?”

“I’m the queen of spontaneity.”

Laughing, I then decided to try one of the new questions that I came up with after my interview with Joshua. “Can you tell me a story that happened to you? It can be funny, sad, whatever you want.”

She thought for a few moments. “I do have one actually. In my English class, my professor always somehow manages to bring up sex. Because of that, I’d always mention 50 Shades of Gray. I love 50 Shades. It’s a horribly written book but aside from that I love it. So every single class, when my professor brings it up I say, ‘50 Shades?’ It’s an ongoing joke.

Macey continued her story. “One day, the girl who sits next to me says, ‘What is 50 Shades? I don’t know what that is.’

“‘It’s a book about B.D.S.M,’ my professor explained.

“The girl was like, ‘What’s B.D.S.M?’

“The professor begins explaining to the girl what each letter of the acronym stands for, however she couldn't remember what the ‘B’ stood for.”

Macey paused for a moment and then went on. “That’s when I cut in and said, ‘It stands for bondage.’

“‘Oh bondage,’ my professor said. Suddenly she pauses for a moment and then looks at me. She asks, ‘Wait Macey, how do you know what that means?’

“Soon all of my classmates- including a friend of mine who used to live down the hall from me- is like, ‘Wait Macey, how do you that?’ And, ‘Yeah Macey, how do you know that?’ Next thing I know I’m all over Fade. It’s bad, but it’s funny. I’m now Fade famous apparently. I got to love my haters. Anyway, I think that’s a pretty comical story.”

It really was hilarious. I really can’t do the story she told me justice though, so I do ask my readers to take my word for it.

I decided to get a little serious though with my next question, since she brought the topic up. “You said you like 50 Shades of Gray. What do you think of the controversy behind it?”

“I feel most people who have issues with it either are judging it based on what they heard or else have read reviews by people who are biased against it. They don’t realize that there’s a story. I mean- she does agree to it. I personally don’t think the relationship is abusive. Does he manipulate her a bit? Yeah- but I think everyone kind of manipulates each other. I’ll admit, sometimes I can be manipulative as well. People don’t realize that there’s a story, or that he’s not a complete asshole. There was some serious shit that happened to him that kind of made him the way he is. She loves him, and he love hers. It inspires him to change his ways. In my opinion it doesn't condone an abusive relationship.”

“What do you say to people who were protesting the movie? People saying that it’s dirty or wrong or anything along those lines?”

“Is it dirty? Yeah. But really to each his own. People have funny fetishes. I mean…well here’s an example. Many people worship a man who got nailed to a cross. I don’t bring this up for an example to be offensive. I say that because I do too. I’m Catholic. Yet to people outside of Christianity, that can be considered a funny fetish or stupid. They can be like, ‘Why would you do that? That’s dumb!’ I’m just saying that anything can be looked at as a fetish or a dirty thing.”

“You just mentioned that you’re Catholic,” I said. “Do people ever see what you do and how you view the world and then realize you’re Catholic and they give you the double-take look?”

“Definitely,” Macey confirmed. “For instance, I've had people tell me- because I’m bi- that I can’t be Catholic and have that orientation. I’ll be like, ‘Well that’s too bad because I’m here. It’s a thing, it happens. My family is from the South- which is very religious. Most of my family is very religious. My godfather is gay and he’s actually very religious. People say that it’s not possible to be gay and religious. I say, 'Too bad, it is.' That’s actually one of the reasons why I like the current Pope. He’s more accepting towards the gay community. He may not agree with it, but at least he’s setting a different tone. I’m hoping someday the views that the Church maintains will change.”

I was both amazed and impressed she was willing to share such thoughts with me. As our interview drew to a close, I asked her, “Are you sure it’s okay I put that in the interview?”

“Oh you’re fine,” she reassured me. “What I told you is what everyone else already knows or soon will find out.”

I thanked Macey for sharing her story with me. “I got some good stuff here,” I told her. “Thank you again for doing this. I really appreciate it.”

“Not a problem,” she said. “I’m glad to be of help.”

I checked to make sure she was cool with everything else we discussed being in the blog. I told her where she could find the pages, and that the update would be up in the next few days. After that we went our separate ways, saying we’d see each other the next day. (She and I have both a Religious Studies and a Sociology class together. They’re on different days.)

I do want to say that I appreciate how open Macey was about her back-story. I know that not everyone would be comfortable doing that so I did truly appreciate it. She is definitely an intriguing face of I.U.P. that has many different interesting facets to her personality, and many layers to her story. Plus, she’s real funny. It just goes to show that people aren't so simple that you can easily wrap them in a package.

Unfortunately we’re coming to the end of this. Before I do head out, I do want to say that any and all opinions that the people I interview maintain may or may not match my own. I won’t deny that I have my own opinions and ideas- but my goal with this blog is to tell other people’s stories. Any ideas held may or may not be shared by me or by the university.

Be sure to check back soon. Spring Break is around the corner, but hopefully I’ll have some more faces that I can blog and more stories to share over the Break. As always feedback is much appreciated- be it praise or constructive criticism. Until next time, catch you all later!