There’s something in these hills. For our fellow Clemson Tigers, this one sentence needs no explanation. For those unaware, there is an unspoken rule among the Clemson faithful that stepping into Tigertown just feels different. Coming into our fifth years at Clemson, this is exactly the feeling that we had. Little did we know what those hills had in store for us.

Our introduction as friends began on September 5th, 2021 in the heart of the Clemson campus on a hot fall day. The guy dressed in camouflage walking towards the young woman in business professional attire would have been a funny scene for anyone to witness. Our friendship quickly grew over our love of serving Clemson, being the “dad” or “mom” of our respective friend groups, and tearing up Clemson University Guide Association (CUGA) functions. While many of our friends graduated, we both returned for one final semester in the Fall of 2023.

As super seniors, we naturally gravitated towards each other as company. There was hardly a moment where you could find one of us and the other wasn’t close by. Nothing has ever felt as natural or easy as being around each other that fall. It wasn’t until the day before Halloween that Jake finally had his lightbulb moment: he had feelings for his best friend. They don’t call it a spooky season for nothing. After two weeks of seeing each other everyday, we agreed to become partners on November 12, 2023 and haven’t looked back.

Our journey as lifelong partners is just getting started. We have overcome over a year of long distance, months of not being able to talk, only seeing each other on free weekends from work, and hours of missing each other. We moved, started full-time jobs, and are planning the most important day of our lives. There is nobody that we would rather do any of this with. It’s amazing the things you will see when you stop and open your eyes to what God puts in front of you. For this Midwestern boy and this Southern gal, it’s a life partner that can give you that same home-y feeling that you get when you return to the little town of Clemson, South Carolina. There’s something in those hills. We are some of the fortunate few that are able to take a small piece of it with us for the rest of our lives.

-Future Mr. and Mrs. Crawford