Diverse Upbringing

Great achievements are not born from a single vision but from the combination of many distinctive viewpoints. Diversity challenges assumptions, opens minds, and unlocks our potential to solve any problems we may face. -- Unknown

Last weekend, my family and I went to the Apple Festival at Wolcott Cider Mill and Winery.  We have gone almost every year since we moved back to Michigan in the early '90's.  Over the years, it has really expanded (the winery was added in the last few years) and the crowds have gotten larger.  For my family, it has become a yearly tradition that we have all come to enjoy. 


While we were sitting in the barn area eating donuts and got to talking about how more often than not, we would visit museums and aquarium's when traveling or in the cities around us and go to festivals like this one.  It was just how Mom and Dad raised us, despite the fact that they weren't.  When we were little, they would just put us in a car and they would find things to do just because they wanted to and now that all of us are older, its like second nature.  We never felt like it was forced upon us, but how things are supposed to go.  Maybe this is why we are all as tolerant of different cultures and people. 


A good example of this is during the conversation, a country song came on that I knew and had recently downloaded and I started singing along with it, while still listening to the conversation.  Jay stopped the conversation and asked, "Are you seriously singing this song?"  They all know that I will listen to anything if it sounds good.  Mom just said that it's just like what we are talking about, how you have to be open to anything.  Music included. 


In today's world, I feel like is it an advantage to have a diverse upbringing where almost anything is tolerated and is almost necessary.  Even more so as a minority, whether it be racial, gender, whatever.  As I look back, I love that I was raised this way and know that if I ever had a family, I would continue this way of thinking and set the same example that my parents did.