Page 77 - ION Indie Magazine JulyAug 2023

MH: I need to ask about your ‘other’ life. You are a man of many endeavors. Share with our
readers a little about your background.

AD: Ha, ha! Yeah, man. I could be here for a long time going on about all of the things I could label
as ‘passions’ of mine. I went to school for meteorology, first getting a bachelor’s degree at the
University of Oklahoma and then going to the University of Wisconsin-Madison for a master’s
degree. I thought I was going to go to work after the master’s but ended up coming back to
Oklahoma to do a doctoral degree in meteorology. I’ll be starting my fifth year in the doctoral
program this fall. Some aspects of being a graduate student are terrible, but others are great. One
nice perk is that the university treats the research aspect of the position as a job, and you get paid
as such. The schedule is also very flexible if you maintain productivity, so it allows me to travel and
play music while still making a little money back home. Before college, I spent most of my life racing
motocross. I’m sure it wasn’t actually every weekend, but it sure felt like it. We traveled quite a bit
doing that, especially to Texas, but also many other states outside of Oklahoma. Though we took
it very seriously, I was never good enough to make a living out of it. I think my brother may have
had a shot at making a career out of it, but things just didn’t work out that way. All that being said,
motocross (much like music) is a lifestyle all its own that’s very hard to get away from. I still own a
bike and was still racing full time up until a few months ago when shows started taking over my
weekends. Dirt bikes are very much still tied to my identity and probably always will be.