Just One More Thing

I love music. As I sit here typing this I’m listening to Mumford & Sons’ Babel album from last spring, a terrific one to check out if you haven’t already. But I seriously like to listen to music a lot. Some people might say that I’m slightly obsessive with my tunes, and I’m okay with that. I’m especially anal about driving to tunes in the car. I get so easily ticked at the music that’s constantly overplayed on the radio, so I always have to DJ for myself when I’m driving. In fact, when “Blurred Lines” is the only song playing at any moment among my six preset radio stations, I contemplate pulling over and getting out of the car entirely until it ends. Or hitting a tree. I’ve never been an overly talented musician, although I was 3 rd chair among saxophones in middle school band. But I do think my band participation helps me appreciate the hard work people put in to making music and the talent that musical creation requires. I greatly enjoy singing along, too. I go...

I woke up this morning at 5:40 am. The greatest part in waking up that early was that I did so on accident and could go right back to sleep. It might have been carrying over from yesterday when I woke up around the same time. Yesterday I couldn’t go right back to sleep though, seeing as I was out at Camp and had to first deal with the camper dilemma which woke me up in the first place. The weird thing about getting up that early at Camp, though? I didn't mind one. single. bit. I had the great privilege of going out to Clemson’s Outdoor Lab these past few days and getting back to work as a camp counselor. I loved being able to spend time back out at that beautiful place (we got to go on the pontoon which I hadn’t been able to do all summer! Plus it truly felt like fall for the first time this month) and help provide a respite camp for profoundly disabled individuals for the weekend. It was amazing getting to see some summer friends I hadn’t seen for weeks. We were able to pick ...

Where were you 12 years ago today? That’s a popular question today, with it being the 11 th day of September. Personally, I don’t remember much from that day. I had just turned nine. I do remember getting home and my mom avidly watching the news and her keeping a close eye on me while all I wanted to do was go play with a friend. At least that’s how I think I remember it. I couldn’t have realized the significance of that day then, not like I do now. As I aged, each year I came to a greater sense of what that day has meant to our nation over the years. Heck, we’re still dealing with a war that was started about that time. The president and our country may have changed, but in that regard the saying holds true that the more things change the more they stay the same. And it is amazing, with each passing year to acknowledge the fact that the tragedy was however many years ago. This year it’s 12. I worked at a camp this past summer and there were plenty of kids I counseled that we...

I applied to Clemson University and the University of South Carolina as a senior in high school. I had never been super engrossed as to which school I rooted for and visited both so it came down to which accepted me and then which one I wanted to go to. Two and a half years later I can safely say that choosing to become a Tiger may quite possibly be the greatest decision I’ve made in my life. And that’s not to rag on South Carolina at all. I’ve got some good friends from high school that attend the school and the major I was looking at there is a great one and for a time was a big pull. But Clemson has provided me such a great experience and such wonderful opportunities that I can’t imagine having ended up anywhere else. Really, I can’t imagine it. Maybe that’s a shot at how poor my imagination gets as I age into my 21 st year here on this earth. But more to come on that in a second. I think about how spectacular Clemson is all the time, from the students to the professors t...