It's All Perspective

A freight train rolls along the Susquehanna River one block away and lets loose a slow, deliberate horn blast as the rolling sounds of its wheels ease through Marietta.

I like the trains. Now, in Winter, with all the windows tightly closed the train's horn is somewhat muted. In deep summer with all the windows open wide the horn blasts through the house like a bull.

I grew up on 7-acres and slept each night to the sound of complete silence.

When I moved to Philadelphia I lived between an Amtrack line, a fire station and a police station. It was quite a change to get used to. There was always a screaming something it seemed. I don't think I ever felt I could relax the three-years I lived there.

But to Philadelphia natives I got to know, the silence of 7-acres in Myerstown would drive them absolutely insane.

When I got to Philadelphia I would ask people, "What's that smell?" It was just the smell of the Delaware River.

When I took people from Philadelphia to Myerstown they would say, "What's that smell?" It was just the smell of the manure on the fields.

So it's all a matter of perspective. And as a matter of perspective, we have amongst us quite a few.

Once I took a good friend to a trail that followed a creek which eventually turned into a waterfall, through Pennsylvania woods at their finest. My friend grew up in the city, and had virtually never ventured from the city, especially into open space such as these woods.

He was absolutely terrified. Not unlike some of us would be walking through some parts of some cities.

All a matter of perspective.

When I transferred to Ohio University I called and begged admissions to not put me in a freshman dorm. I was a senior and experiencing the freshman dorm is something no one should have to do more than once.

Everything was arranged and when I arrived in Athens, Ohio I was thrilled and frightened to find myself in a dorm full of graduate students from all around the world. My roomate was from Argentina. I made good friends from Columbia, South Korea, Puerto Rico, France, Cyprus. Gathering together in rooms in the evening it was like living at the United Nations.

We had nothing in common. And that was great.

But wow, at dinner time, the smells of the world cooking all at once, all in one hallway - it wasn't working.

I try to fit in at the country club and the biker bar, all because I want to soak in all the different perspectives. Reaching out to experience and learn more about others helps me to develop, and evolve my own perspective.