Strange is relative...

Every kid learns the phrase “never speak to strangers”—and for good reason. There is a lot of bad in the world, so much that parents try to shelter their children from the unknown in order to keep them safe. Personally, my mom reminded me of these words every time I left the house when I was young, but my dad had a different take on things.

He had a very rough childhood, to say the least. He grew up on the streets and was involved in gang activity at the all too young age of twelve. The “strangers” on the streets became his family. When my brother and I were growing up he warned us of all of the dangers that we might face in the world, but he also taught us to always give people a chance to prove their worth. My father is to this day one of the most accepting people I know—and because of this I am able to make friends/connections everywhere I go.

 

Being accepting of all types of people does not mean that you have to like them or understand them—it just means keeping an open mind & trying to understand their story. I visited home recently and my mom said “you never were very good at avoiding strangers, but it works for you.”  She said this because I recently got the opportunity to meet my favorite hip hop artist, Logic, all because of a “stranger” who read my blog. The stranger was Logic himself and he happened to stumble across a post I wrote about our similar childhoods & how I admired him for rapping about the positive sides of life and the fact that he doesn’t have lyrics that are vulgar towards women like the majority of rappers.

Others from his music label, Visionary Music Group, stumbled onto my blog after this and connected with me as well & I became good friends with a few of them. I have since had the opportunity to meet the majority of those involved with VMG and the music world in general all because I tried to get to know a “stranger”.

Strange is a relative word, much like normal.

Photo credit: Nick Mahar