Kaitlyn Bates: The Woman Behind the Mystery

By Alyssa Ballard, ENGL 336.001

Kaitlyn Bates is 21 years old. She was born in “middle of nowhere", North Ogden, Utah on January 1, 1990. "Born and raised there for the first 15 years of my life…true story.” Kaitlyn has 1 younger brother, and 1 older step-brother who is getting married. She is majoring in English with a concentration in professional writing. She wishes to edit and publish young adult novels. In her free time she enjoys reading, driving, and what she describes as“normal college stuff” like hanging with friends and studying.

When she was younger, Kaitlyn dreamed of being an Olympic figure skater or a psychologist, and dressed up as a Three Musketeers bar for Halloween. Now she sees herself in 10 years working at a publishing house, living in Boston, and possibly married. She likes to read mystery and young adult novels.

Kaitlyn’s favorite movie is 10 Things I Hate About You, and her favorite color is yellow. Her nickname is also yellow. Apparently one day in high school one of her friends noticed that there were too many Kate’s in their school. That day “I was using a yellow notebook and a yellow pen, so she gave me the nickname “yellow”.”

A random fact is that she strongly believes in karma.

For more information about karma, check out this website: http://dharma.ncf.ca/introduction/truths/karma2.html

She describes herself as caring, fun, and geeky. When asked, two of her friends also described her in three words. Melanie Herring described her as “quirky, because she likes a lot of unusual things, amazing, because she’s my best friend, and ‘cause she’s amazing, and smart." Her friend Victoria Kenton described her as Intelligent, empathetic, and colorful. Intelligent because she’s an “English major, but she tends to just know things. Empathetic because when one of her friends has a problem, she can really understand what they’re saying, she can calm them down and help them to see things more clearly when it could’ve been clouded by emotions. And colorful, in the language that she uses, and how she acts and dresses, she’s very colorful and bright.” Melanie has known Kaitlyn since FSU preview, and Victoria has known her for about seven years. Together they know Kaitlyn pretty well.