preconceived thoughts and judgements - some self reflection

It's taken many years and a good bit of travel to come to this very simple vantage point.  In the past, primarily as I traveled, I had quite a little pet peave about folks judgements and preconceived notions as they met me for the first time.  Here's my perception of the type of first meeting that got under my skin.  Let's say I'm in LA, and meet someone.  They'd hear my southern drawl, and asked where I'm from.  My reply - North Alabama.  They might smile and ask where I went to school - The University of Mississippi.  I would read judgement all over their face as they seemed to know all there was to know about me.  And, usually, we'd both just get to whatever business we were there for.

The new revelation;  My preconceived thoughts and judgments about them were probably just as off based as theirs were.  Of course, I have/had incorrect judgements about people from LA, New York, Canada, Germany, India, Afghanistan, really anywhere that I have or haven't visited.  Certainly anywhere I haven't lived and spent plenty of time getting to know the people and the area.

What has been reevealed here, is that I was just as bad or worse at making ignornant preconceived judgements as anyone that I had been judging for judging me!

To some degree is a quote from Pat Conroy's South of Broad which I will be posting next.