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SALT LAKE CITY — In this year's Westminster College graduation, a former student donned a cap and gown and walked with his classmates — even though he wasn't eligible for a diploma.
An insidious villain grabbed hold of young Bryant Sheppard a long time ago, trying to bring him down, trying to dampen his love for life.
He was diagnosed with a form of ocular cancer at age 6, and he responded well to treatment. But at age 14, doctors removed one of his tumorous eyes and replaced it with a prosthetic eye.
But still the shadow lingered. In the years that followed, cancer returned again and again.
In junior high, he was diagnosed with bone cancer. The cancer hit even harder in high school. And even though Bryant had to drop out his junior year, he kept up on studies at home, returning and graduating with his senior class from Skyline High — and earning a scholarship to Westminster College.
With bone cancer cells now in his lungs, liver and pancreas and fluid building up in his body, doctors project Bryant has only a few months — possibly only a few weeks — to live. But still, as always, he takes a stand that has become familiar to everyone who knows him.
"There's no point resenting it or getting angry about it. That won't accomplish anything. So the way I've always seen it is just press on," he said.
And therein lies what he's been about all these years.
"The way I see it, I can either sit in a corner and kind of scream at the world, or I can keep my head up and try to continue on with life and just enjoy things," Bryant said.
For friends and classmates who've rubbed shoulders with him, Bryant's philosophy about life has a lasting effect.
"He's got the greatest attitude out of anyone I've ever met. All the time he still goes out of his way to help other people. It's never anything about me," said student Patrick Hanna.
Classmate Danielle Doherty echoes the same sentiment.
"My dad was killed two years ago in a car accident back in Ireland — a very bad one — and Bryant has really shown me that there is life always continuing and you have to be such a strong person. He (Bryant) really is a light in my life, like a guardian angel," she said.
With cancer treatments always in the wings, Bryant only finished about two years of college at Westminster. Even though he wasn't eligible for a diploma, professors and students petitioned the administration to break protocol and offer some kind of recognition. The history was there. Through it all, he's been a fighter, pushing on in high school, becoming an EMT graduate and teacher, helping others for three years as part of an ambulance team, and more when he entered college. With a keen mind in science and chemistry, he served as president of the school's chemistry club.
"He was taking organic chemistry. If he had been on campus all four years, he'd be graduating with honors right now," classmate Wyatt McNeil said. Christopher Gumpper has been a close friend of Bryant for the past 10 years. "People oftentimes lose track of what the point of an education is, which is to teach people to think. And you would be hard pressed to find a better intellectual than Bryant — somebody who can think and thinks critically."
The way I see it, I can either sit in a corner and kind of scream at the world, or I can keep my head up and try to continue on with life and just enjoy things.
–Bryant Sheppard
Even on bad days, Bryant also holds on to his sense of humor.
"When I was diagnosed the second time while I was in college, my immediate thought was awesome, I don't have to have my calculus midterm today," he said.
"Even in the face of it, he's always been upbeat and making jokes, and I thought that was something that really set him apart," said classmate Randy Malm.
At Saturday's graduation, Bryant didn't receive a diploma, but he did receive a "Certificate of Academic Achievement." This was Westminster's closure to a very special person.
Bryant believes in living life until life ends.
"Don't give up and don't let the disease become a part of your life," he said. "It's too easy to become fixated on the cancer more than actual life. Focus on the good and the fun you can still have."
