Elizabeth Lostetter ’05 is many things: a farmer’s daughter, a student of opera, a margarita enthusiast. She is not, I learned, a firefighter nor a fan of Culture Club. Somehow we still got along. After sampling one of her homemade pumpkin bars, I sat down to get inside of E. Lo’s head.

Shane: OK, so you’re job is to fight fires and stuff, right?

Elizabeth: Yeah, exactly. Fighting forest fires.

Shane: What’s that like? How’d you get that gig?

Elizabeth: I work in the Music department. In the sound booth.

Shane: What? I thought you did some forest service thing.

Elizabeth: I don’t know why . . .

Shane: Someone told me you worked for the Parks Department of St Paul or something.

Elizabeth: Oh, well I worked for the city of St Paul last summer where I cut grass and cleaned up shit and got to drive around in a truck.

Shane: That must have been what I was thinking of.

Elizabeth: But no forest fires.

Shane: So was it a good job anyway?

Elizabeth. Yeah it was really good. Lots of trucks and driving around and no boss.

Shane: So you can drive stick, then?

Elizabeth: Well . . . no.

Shane: Why the hesitation?

Elizabeth: Well, I got to drive those golf cart thingies like they have here, and some of them were stick, but I wouldn’t trust myself to drive a real automobile that was stick.

Shane: Oh, so you were exaggerating when you said you got to drive around trucks. You were really just driving around Cushmans?

Elizabeth: No, I was driving a pick-up truck, but it was automatic.

Shane: Oh. So you’re a music major. Who is the best composer?

Elizabeth: [long silence] Oh…Oh, God. See, that’s a hard one. Because you have your modern pop music, which is great, and your oldey-timey music, and your Baroque . . .

Shane: One for all three categories.

Elizabeth: Oh, no. Damn, I made it harder for myself. Well, I’m in a Shostakovich class, and he’s really fucking sweet. It’s like you get to listen to his symphonies and tear them apart and look at the parts and it’s like reading poetry.

Shane: Which symphony is his best?

Elizabeth: Which symphony? Oh, God…Well, the 8th is really good.

Shane: No way. His 11th is best [N.B. This is the only Shostakovich symphony I’ve ever heard]

Elizabeth: Well, we haven’t gotten to that one yet.

Shane: By the way, that pumpkin bar you gave me was really good. Do you bake a lot?

Elizabeth: Yeah, I have a domestic streak. I make pumpkin bars and cookies and pies. I only know how to make apple and pumpkin right now, but I want to branch out. Actually, I don’t know if I really want to branch out because those are the only ones I really like. But I should make more of those because I have 4 blocks of cream cheese but no pumpkin and a bunch of apples but no butter.

Shane: So what’s in the future for you?

Elizabeth: Oh! I’m going to move to Montana and live in the mountains and repair trails for Glacier National Park and shovel snow and stuff like that.

Shane: Really?

Elizabeth: Yeah. Only I don’t have the brute strength for it just yet. And only for a year. It’s not what I want to do for the rest of my life.

Shane: Why do you need brute strength to do that?

Elizabeth: It’s like 12 hour days of lifting stones and rock and shoveling snow. It’s probably just a pipe dream [to get the job] but maybe if I work for it. But if I get it I can just hang out in the mountains and drink and maybe write and not have to write papers.

Shane: So how do they determine if you’ve got enough brute strength when you apply? Do they just look you up and down and size you up?

Elizabeth: Well, the application process depends on which park you apply for. Sometimes you need to have a physical and have a doctor ascertain that you are physically capable of performing the work. But they’re also looking for things like skills in masonry and carpentry.

Shane: You’re a mason?

Elizabeth: [laughing] No, no. But I do have carpentry experience from building sets for a community theatre with my dad back in Buffalo.

Shane: I thought you were from Minnesota.

Elizabeth: Buffalo, Minnesota.

Shane: Oh.

Elizabeth: By the way, I really like this overhead light above us. It makes me feel like you’re in the FBI.

Shane: OK, pretend I’m in the FBI. What do you have to tell me?

Elizabeth: What?

Shane: I think that was a bad question.

Elizabeth: [laughing] Yeah, I think so too.

Shane: So I’m told you’re a fan of the karaoke.

Elizabeth: Yeah! It’s mostly at this bar where Jana Ellingson [‘04] is the host every Wednesday. It’s actually happening right now, but I’m not there. I have class every Wednesday and I have homework, too. But I’ve noticed that once you’re old enough to go to bars, you somehow find ways to finish your homework before you go out to the bar. Or just bring a bottle of wine to the library.

Shane: So in karaoke, are you an observer or a participant?

Elizabeth: I do the suicide thing [“Suicide Karaoke” is a form of karaoke in which your friends choose a song for you without telling you what the song is in advance]. I end up singing things I otherwise wouldn’t like “Karma Chameleon.”

Shane: Why wouldn’t you sing “Karma Chameleon”?

Elizabeth: Well, for one thing, I don’t know the words. I had always thought they were saying “Come-ah Come-ah Come-ah.” “Karma Chameleon” Doesn’t make any sense.

Shane: Well, neither does “Come-ah Chameleon.”

Elizabeth: I guess. But I also just don’t like that song.

Shane: So for karaoke are you of the “imitate the artist” school or the “make it your own” school?

Elizabeth: Definitely “make it your own.” You’ve got to put your whole heart in it, your whole being, and just really belt it out. And be really bad. And it helps to be relatively drunk. Or I guess you can be really good. You just can’t be middle-of-the-road.

Shane: OK, I know you’ll be preaching to the choir here, but suspenders…

Elizabeth: They’re great!

Shane: I know!

Elizabeth: I just gotta say, there’s something about suspenders. They keep your pants up and they give you this look like a 19th Century shop-keep. I was hoping to get some shirt garters…

Shane: What are shirt garters?

Elizabeth: They’re like garters, but for your shirt. It holds your sleeve away from your hand. I don’t know, I just think things like suspenders and shirt garters are awesome.

Shane: I’m with you.

Elizabeth: But I’m worried about you printing that. I don’t want to become one of those Macalester institutions like “Oh yeah, there’s Suspenders Girl.”

Shane: I don’t think that will happen. Besides that wouldn’t really be such a bad name to have.

Elizabeth: Really? I don’t want to be Anything Girl.