Perchance Meetings

When people don’t extend themselves in acts of friendship they learn nothing about society.

I see this time and time again. My friends that are suspicious of people not like themselves signals to me that they have no experience with meeting others.

My life has been made productive by meeting others, establishing relationships, getting to know anyone and everyone.

I’ve spent my life meeting people.

I know judges, lawyers, policemen, criminals, drug addicts, Vice Presidents, preachers, priests, saints and sinners and neer-do-wells and maurauders.

I know or have met people from distant countries, dignitaries, peasants, tribesman, aristocrat’s, millionaires and even billionaires.

I know farmers and ranchers that have created family legacies in a few short generations on land sacrificed by my friends that are native.

I know Ho Chunk, Ojibway, Tohono O’doham, Navajo, Crow, Cheyenne, Pueblo, Jicara Apache, Lakota, and other Siouxian tribes.

I’m grateful for parents and family that encouraged me to extend a hand in friendship to others.

I would struggle to think of a negative experience. All has been interesting and good.

Yet some people I know only seem comfortable with people that are just like them.

They spend their time talking about people unlike themselves. It boggles my mind, it seems so boring.

They seem to live with a stunted interest in all that surrounds them.

I was born amazed at everything around me and especially people that are not a carbon copy of myself.

Criminey ! Be inquisitive! People are fascinating, people have varied interests and ideas, most people are kind and caring.

Many of my friends come from far flung places, that makes them far more interesting than people that don’t extend themselves to others.

My new found friends are far more adventurous, the others just lack.

Tonight I met Melvin Long-Time-Sleeping , he is from the Blackfoot Tribe, his wife is from the Arapahoe Nation.

In conversation I found out they attended the Flandreau Indian School just a few miles from my hometown.

I learned about them, I learned more about the Indian School, I learned about their Grandchildren, They live far from Flandreau, South Dakota, close to Glacier National Park in Northern Montana.

They have caused me to want to learn more about the Flandreau Indian School, so close to my hometown.

There are friends to be made in most every part of our journeys and it broadens my interest, it heightens my appreciation for others not exactly like myself.

My charge to you is to go out and meet a few new people this month.

Report back and tell me of your experience on this posting.