Future will separate Neiman triplets

Ross, Trent and Talia Neiman, 18, are triplets who will graduate from Freeman High School June 11. They have an interesting take on what their lives have been like.

“The best part of being a triplet is messing with people,” Ross said. “People always ask, always, ‘Can you read your twin’s mind?’ The answer is yes. Yes, I can.”

The three have a list of words memorized in case anyone asks them to think of a word and then ask one of the other two to come up with it.

They definitely have a sense of humor, but the three also have a lot to be proud of when they walk across the stage at graduation.

The Neimans have their own interests and seem to excel at each of them.

Talia has been involved in gymnastics, soccer and track. She is in advance placement biology. She hopes to study kinesiology and Spanish when she gets to the University of Washington next fall.

“I think I’m just going to see where my interests take me,” she said. “I would like to pursue the kinesiology sort of thing. Just anything working with children or athletes would be awesome.”

Ross loves astronomy. He was in track, baseball, basketball and cross country. He’s on the Knowledge Bowl team and in the Conservation Club. When he attends Western Washington University next year, he wants to study physics.

“You can’t just get your undergrad in astronomy,” Ross said. “I have to do physics first. There’s a ton of just many different jobs you can do for physics. Hopefully I can figure out some job I can do with astronomy.”

Trent is the musician of the group. He was also on the Knowledge Bowl team and in Conservation Club. He plays nine instruments and wants to study the tuba when he gets to the University of Puget Sound next fall. He also loves biology and will double major in music and biology.

“I love music. I spend a lot of my free time doing that. I’ve always found biology fascinating.”

Maintaining their individuality hasn’t seemed like a problem for them, although the rest of the world likes to group them together as a unit.

“We’re all three pretty different,” Ross said. “Talia’s a pretty decent athlete. Trent is pretty musically inclined, scientifically, mathematically. I’m more, I guess, sciencey. We kind of all got our different areas, which is kind of cool.”

The three credited their mother for this who made a point of dressing them all differently and didn’t give them names that rhyme.

“People see us as a unit. Always as a group,” Talia said. “But we’re so different from each other. In a good way, obviously.”

They are a very tight-knit group. They laugh and joke with each other, have many of the same friends and generally get along with each other. The Neimans even seem to get along when they have to share one car – voted the worst car at Freeman in the yearbook this year.

Of course, it’s going to be difficult next fall.

“I’ve never spent more than a month away from any of my twins,” Ross said.

Trent said he once spent six weeks away in a math program in Seattle, and although it was nice the first week, by the third or fourth he really wanted to talk to his siblings.

“I’m used to having them there my whole life,” Trent said and acknowledged there are many ways to communicate when they are apart. “I’m sure it’s going to be refreshing to be an individual and not necessarily be thought of with your siblings.”

“We’re all going to different colleges,” Talia said. “We’re all going to be on the West Coast. But it’s sad. I love my brothers so much.”

“I’m going to miss my twins very much,” Ross said. “You meet new people and the hardest part is when your twins aren’t around. No one believes that you’re a triplet.”