Now and Forever

Jan 4, 2007, 5:36 PM

At 23 years of age I made the most important decision of my life thus far. I made the decision to attended Clemson University and I am, Now and Forever a Clemson Man. Let’s back up a moment though. When I was eighteen, I made the worst string of decisions in my time on this earth, or so it seemed. If you could meet my rather large family, you would never believe that until December 21, 2006, that I am the first of them since the 60’s to wear a Clemson ring. From the moment of conception I was raised to love Clemson University. I just knew it all my life that I would go to school there. However, like lots of eighteen year olds, I thought everything would kind of ‘work itself out’. I made good grades in HS and to me it was just a given that I would be accepted. Well, I waited too long to apply to Clemson and when I got my letter back, my heart dropped when it said, “I regret to inform you that we can not accept you into Clemson University for the fall of 1998”. I was absolutely demoralized. But all hope was not lost. I was not rejected from admission, yet it was my laziness in applying that kept me from getting in the place I knew I belonged. What happed was that there wasn’t any room left in the dorms, so I was given a conditional pre-acceptance for the spring semester of 1999. The condition was to attend another institution and earn a 3.0 GPA. That being, I attended Francis Marion University, where both of my parents graduated. For reasons that I only understand now, I did absolutely horrible that first semester. I hated where I lived, I hated going to class, I hated the school, and I hated Florence. I basically hated that I was not at Clemson, period. So what did I do? I traveled the east coast seeing music; I spent extra long weekends at Clemson football games; I did any and everything but school. I didn’t even make it half way to my goal of a 3.0 and I had no idea of what being a student meant. Over the course of almost two years at FMU, I earned less than 30 transferable credits and wasted a ton of my parent’s money before dropping out. After trying my hand at the “real world”, I finally realized that I would never be happy until I went through with my dreams and gave Clemson my best shot. I got the balls to get back into school and started attending Florence Darlington Tech where I quickly earned an Assoc in Science. I will never forget the feeling when I reapplied to Clemson and read the words “Congratulations”. Holding that piece of paper in my hand, I knew that right then and there that I would not waste this opportunity. I fear that if I would have attended Clemson right out of HS that I would have likely made the same mistakes with school, maybe dropped out, and then probably would have never given Clemson another shot. It was those feelings of failure and that fact that everything from here on out was coming from my pocket that gave me the motivation to succeed.

What I know now that I didn’t know then, is that my time of troubles is probably the main reason that I did so well at Clemson and can say that I’m, Now and Forever a Clemson Man. It has been a few weeks since I walked across that stage, but I am just now beginning to realize that everything I went through before has made me a better person. I was simply not ready to do what it takes to seriously make it in school. The feeling of being handed that diploma and shaking President Barker’s hand as I whispered “One Clemson” to him is absolutely indescribable. As I sit here and write thank you notes and read all the letters of congratulations, I see exactly what this University means to me and my family. And not just that, but what it means to so many people before me and so many people that will follow. The Clemson experience is something that will never leave me. I loved it so much that I am staying around here until the end of summer. I have been hired on by Dr. Bradley Hersh to work in his genetics lab. Dr. Hersh is a new addition to the Clemson family and I think I will be the one of if not the first person to work in his lab. It’s not a career type position but I am so excited about spending more time at this great place that I can barely stand it. I’m convinced that I will learn more in these next 8 months than I have during my entire time here, and maybe it will help me figure out exactly what I want to study in graduate school.

People tell me how proud my grandfather would be to see his first descendant become a Clemson Man, and I can’t help but well up in tears. Tears of joy, tears of pain, tears of fear for what’s next. Now there is another in my family attending Clemson, and I could not be more proud of her. My younger brother and her brother as well, are following the same path as I did, and I will try my hardest to get them to realize that not all hope is lost. That is the same message I have for any of you out there that may be in the same boat that I was. No matter how old you are, or how bad you have messed up until now, you can without a doubt realize your dreams and you too can become, Now and Forever a Clemson man.

God Bless our great University and GO TIGERS!
Bryan Cox Class of ’06

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Now and Forever

Wish I could vote for this 100 times

Congratulations and well done.

Well done young man, and well written. And

Awesome story,check your T-Mail ******

Congratulations, looks like

congratulations! :)***

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