Name: Amy DeCastro
Position: Welder/Harry Potter enthusiast
Time at Moots: 4 years

The Yampa River holds a special place in my heart. Its seeping banks remind me of my New England roots, especially in the early morning when steam hovers over the water and the willowy necks of sandhill cranes poke out of the tall grass.

My favorite days start with a quiet run by the Yampa, watching Steamboat wake up. Sometimes I spy a swaying line of gondolas starting their way up Mt. Werner on the opposite side of the valley, the sun rising behind it.

Swapping my sneakers for wellies, I grab a little starter mug of coffee and my 12-year-old mutt, Hannah to head out for a walk. Returning to the house, she crunches kibble with her ‘old lady medicine’. I usually snag oatmeal with pumpkin in it from home, or a bamboo bongo from our local grocer, Bamboo Market. Breakfast is followed by my ‘real’ cup of coffee, a travel mug slipped into my water bottle cage.

At work I tackle seat posts, seat stay kits, seat tubes, and a few other tasks in welding. There is always a steady stream of subassemblies and components running over my welding bench. My favorites are the stems; so little, yet somehow so complete and interesting.

Often, classes at the local college break up my workday. I’m majoring in applied math and studying evolutionary ecology. On any given day you can find a math problem scribbled on my welding bench or tacked to the corkboard by my desk. It’s somehow soothing and beautiful to me (cringe if you want to, but I love it). A couple days a week I also tutor algebra and calculus at the college, and find that satisfying as well (shake your head if you need to).

Lunch is almost always a salad and a once-over of the Moots vegetable patch. Back to work to weld more stems and seat posts before heading to the library for some study time. I like to take the scenic route, the core trail by the river, back to the house.

In the evenings, I love dinner and a stroll with my tall, dark, and handsome. Sushi and sweet potato fries are staples at my house, followed up by popcorn, ice cream, or a cookie if I’m baking a batch for the Moots crew. Conversations of bicycles, constellations, and calculus occupy the strolling, as the mosquitoes hum and the trout make the river go ‘plunk, plunk!’ Long after the last gondola has shimmied its way back down the mountain, I tuck in to dream of birds and bicycles