My time spent at the College of Charleston was a little longer and a lot more challenging than most of my fellow graduates.  I would take off a semester, sometimes even a year, in hopes of finding an easier way out, to make money, move to California… only to return to the city I love and call home.  After much advice, life lessons, and self-reflection, I came back to the College in January of 2009 self-assured and eager to move on.  The ceremony was beautiful and everything I hoped it would ever be.  I have never been more proud of myself or made such a huge accomplishment.  This simply was the happiest day of my life, so far.

Journal entry 3.22.09

This is it.  I’m finally doing the things I’ve been meaning to do since the beginning.  The beginning of what, I’m not sure.  My journey I suppose.  Right now I’m between classes laying in the grasses of the Cistern Yard.  A picture that has been painted for me ever since I first laid my eyes on the College of Charleston almost nine years ago.

I was an eighteen year old lost soul attending part time at my local community college in Maryland.  I thought I knew everything at the time and school had never been my forté.  I didn’t think much about what was next or where I’d end up, I was satisfied being stagnant.  This all changed when I attend the bi-annual college fair.  It was the first time I ever heard of Charleston, South Carolina.

From the moment I laid my eyes on the College of Charleston brochure showing the graduation ceremony through the Cistern Yard, something sparked (it was more like a smack in the face).  From then on I was determined to challenge myself, buckle down, get good grades, and get out of Maryland.

Two years later I visited my best friend who was attending Coastal Carolina University in Myrtle Beach.  Remembering the beautiful pictures of Charleston, and Randolph Hall in the Cistern Yard, I suggested a day trip to Charleston, so we went.  During the two hour drive down, Charleston was calling, the feeling was intense- almost as intense as the smack in the face.  Once we walked around the city, I knew this was it, this is where I needed to be.  After another year of hard work, and a fantastic letter of recommendation, I was accepted to the College of Charleston.  Happiest day of my life, at the time.

Let me paint the picture for you.  I’m sitting in the midst of beauty, history, and grace.  The same place where my journey began, it will end in just a year from now, so this is the Cistern Yard.  I’m 25 now, Its March and the sunshine is illuminating this place as if angels are all around it.  What ever it is that intuitively brought me to this very spot is reassuring me- I am in the right place at the right time.  Oak trees and Spanish moss, a clock- on time in a timeless place.  It’s all about me now, It is time to finish what a started.  Shoot, I’m late to class.