I knew my major was going to be English-- I've always known. That never wavered. Writing is a way of feeling for me. It's speaking and singing and honesty and the fantastic all at once, and something I love so much that it had to be innate. Who I would allow to teach me about writing, however, was not so cemented. Coastal Carolina wasn’t my first choice for college. It was a safety college, one that my Mother liked and thus one that I hoped to avoid at all costs. I had every intention of going to the College of Charleston. I had already been accepted and offered multiple scholarship that would have paid my way through. My best friend, on the other hand, didn’t have as much freedom on deciding where to go. I was given the choice between attending Charleston on my own, or remaining close to home to support my best friend. I chose to stay with her, and was rewarded for my loyalty when she dropped out after her second semester. I've been told that was a stupid move on my part, and for a time I was inclined to agree. I was trapped at a school I hated with no one I could hate it with.

The only trouble was, I didn’t entirely hate it. Coastal took my expectations and beat me with them. While I struggled with my transfer from a dual-degree high school graduate to a college junior, I found Coastal’s professors to be forgiving. I had no interest in my classes, and I had already decided to transfer. I did so badly towards the end of my first Fall at Coastal that Dr. Oldfield gave me an incomplete and another chance. I don’t know if I deserved it, but her act of kindness made me a better student. The next semester, I left my laptop at home and started taking all of my notes by paper again. My grades weren’t phenomenal- I got sick, made some mistakes, made an F in one class- but I began to feel like I was really learning again. The next Fall, I knew I had changed. I made straight A's that semester, something that I hadn't accomplished since grade school. That change uninterested in the material and hardly put in any effort. A student sitting behind me asked me my opinion on the class, and I told him as much. He said, "That's not fair. You don't even try. You just sit there." He was right, of course. I was being a jackass. knew I'd been slacking, but I never realized how much I let it control me. I decided from that moment on that I would

I had no intention of making new friends, but they seemed to certainly have intentions of befriending me. The students in Coastal's English program are some of the kindest, most resourceful, and most talented people I have ever met.

My time at CCU taught me that my problem with learning was rooted in my own unwilling attitude.