Curiosity takes
me places.
I’m Edison, a Johnson Scholar at Washington and Lee studying economics and philosophy.
I like questions that change what I notice or what I do next. Sometimes that means having a speaker make me rethink a premise. Sometimes it means figuring out whether it’s worth spending the night in a tennis queue. This site is where I write about those experiences and what I’m still thinking about afterward.
Explore below ↓
And a seat worth waiting for. ↗
and a little curiosity.
Conversations that
stayed with me.
At the Oxford Union, I got to ask questions I’d spent hours thinking through. The moments I remember best are when an answer made me hear my own question differently.
Putting ideas into play.
How early should I join the Wimbledon queue? How much of a lead is enough to log off and go to bed? Here’s how I made those calls with the information I had.
Beyond the Notebook.
Rovaniemi, Finland
Northern Lights over frosted trees
Snowmobiling in Rovaniemi
Already dark at 3 p.m.
When my Oxford term ended, a lot of people in my program were heading to Spain or France. I kept thinking about Rovaniemi. From home, I’d have to plan around a transatlantic flight and another leg north, maybe an overnight train from Helsinki. From Oxford, I was already on the right side of the Atlantic and only two hours off Finnish time. If I was ever going to take a chance on seeing the Northern Lights, this felt like the time.
By three in the afternoon, it was already dark. I’d never felt cold like that, and I even had trouble finding some foods I took for granted at home. There was a real chance clouds would hide the aurora the whole time. I could come all that way and leave disappointed. Yet, seeing it come out over the frosted trees made the whole trip worth it. That was, by far, my favorite memory from the trip.
Tennis Encounters
With Stan Wawrinka at the 2023 US Open
With James Keothavong at Wimbledon qualifying
With Nick Kyrgios at the Dog & Fox
I love tennis enough that I’ll happily spend part of a tournament watching practice. At the 2023 US Open, I was looking at the practice schedule as closely as the match schedule. To me, Stan Wawrinka has the greatest one-handed backhand ever, and I wanted to see it up close. While bigger names were drawing crowds to Arthur Ashe, I went to his practice court. It was quiet enough that when he finished, I could ask him for a photo.
At Wimbledon qualifying, James Keothavong’s court was one of the first to finish, so I caught him just as he was getting ready to leave. Because you usually only see umpires on court, you rarely get to ask them for a photo. Nick Kyrgios was in London for a live podcast show during Wimbledon. When he said he’d be at the Dog & Fox, I went. Part of the fun for me is figuring out where to be when everyone else is watching the main event.
Taipei, East Sussex, Edinburgh
Taipei 101 from Elephant Mountain
Sheep grazing above the Seven Sisters cliffs
Sunset over Edinburgh from Arthur’s Seat
When I travel, I like to see what a place looks like from a little higher up. During my study abroad in Taiwan, I hiked Elephant Mountain to see Taipei 101 at night. The climb was easier than I expected, and the payoff felt almost unfair. At the top, I could see the whole skyline without anything in the way, with Taipei 101 lit up right in the middle of it. For me, there’s not much that beats looking out over a city at night.
In East Sussex, I went to see the Seven Sisters, where the chalk cliffs rise and fall along the coast. I ended up spending longer than I expected watching the sheep wander and graze above them. From Arthur’s Seat, I watched the sun go down over Edinburgh. I remember how much I enjoyed just standing there as the light changed. Sometimes the thing you least expect is what holds your attention the longest.
What I keep coming back to.
During Michaelmas 2025, I was a visiting student at Magdalen College, Oxford, where I took tutorials in economics and philosophy. I liked having to say exactly what I thought and explain why, especially when the next question exposed something I’d taken for granted.
I keep coming back to what moves people to act, especially when compassion or conviction is involved. I also wonder how much of a choice is still ours when we let AI make it for us. That’s why I study economics and philosophy: I want to understand what shapes people’s decisions and what matters to them when they make them.
Let’s connect on LinkedIn ↗