Why Doesn’t Everyone Love Summer Like I do?

Summer is here! I’m nearly in heaven! 

I wish I was writing this from a picnic table at a campsite. Or that I was not writing at all, but in my canoe instead, or hiking up a mountain, or even chasing a golf ball around an unforgiving landscape. Or . . . (as long as it’s outside!)

I’m evidently not the only one. Apparently some people even choose careers so that they can be off at this time every year.

I should have been a teacher, not an entrepreneur. 

Not everyone is so seasonal, though. Some live almost every day of the year (at least every week-day) pretty much the same as every other. I used to think that it was because they had no options, they were simply stuck—financially or for other reasons–in such an unhappy state. True, there surely are many in that situation.

But there are others who freely choose that pattern. Typically, they’re people who have a very steady daily job with fixed hours. They prefer to relax every single night. And some even spend their weekends on a similar pattern. They simply prefer daily cycles over seasonal, annual, or sometimes even weekly cycles. They have their mini-vacation daily.

They define the opposite end of the spectrum from which I sit.

But, I’m glad it’s that way. You see, they assure me that the stores will not be open at just random hours in summer when I need them. They assure me that utilities and infrastructure will be continuously maintained. They provide stable and solid employees for me and others. They temper the economic gyrations that might otherwise occur (if everyone was like me).

I’m glad there are people very different from me. I’m glad they have different values (otherwise, I would remain naive); that their philosophical ideas sometimes contrast to mine (otherwise I might become too narrow-minded); that they research and become educated in different fields than I’m interested in (otherwise research would be too limited and civilization would not advance).

I’m glad people are different racially and ethnically (enriching our understanding of the world and its peoples); that people enjoy different music, arts, culture and sports (giving us all choices and variety); that people like different foods and drinks (stretching us all and increasing our options.)

People are simply different from us. How hard it sometimes is to appreciate that! We so easily succumb to the notion that our limited experience is the “normal one.” Which, by implication, means that everyone else’s is sub-normal.

But diversity is a good thing. If we embrace it, it makes us all better people. If we don’t embrace it, that is to our own detriment

At least, that’s how I see it . . .

(Now, let me out of this office and into the great outdoors; this high pressure ridge won’t last long enough.)