Diversity is Wonderful

 

LGBTQ Flag, Jack Lucas
Smith on UnSplash.

This morning, I had several errands to run ahead of a fun birthday party I am going to tomorrow. 

The first stop I needed to make this morning was to a local pharmacy which also sells greeting cards, so I could pick up a card for my friend tomorrow. It did not take me long to find a suitable card and I moved on to check out with the guy at the front cash register. For once, since I had such a small purchase, I did use real live cash which I think threw both of us off. 

As far as the cashier went, I had the deep suspicion he was of the LGBTQ community, as he greeted me warmly. After making small talk concerning how nice of a day it was, I left in route to my second stop, putting gas in the car for tomorrow's trip.

At the gas station, I was not prepared to do anything else but pay at the pump and not see another person. All of those plans went away when the card reader at the pump did not work, and I had to go inside to pay. Again, all the reservations of meeting another person were set aside when the cashier was very nice to me and again, I went on with my day.

My next stop turned out to be the toughest and it did not even involve another person to interact with. It was me trying my best to navigate a new ATM at my bank, so I can give a little birthday gift tomorrow. Whoever designed the new machine did not figure out the person using it needed to be a master mover to use it.  Fortunately, there was no one else in the drive thru, because I finally needed to undo my seat belt and open the door of the car to finish my transaction. 

My final stop was to the nearby coffee shop which my wife Liz and I enjoy, and even I found a way to make an easy trip to a drive thru more difficult. When I arrived at the coffee shop, two huge trash dumpsters were blocking one of the entrances to the business. So, then I needed to follow another road around the end of the building to go into the drive thru from its back entrance. Which I finally did. After I ordered and made it up to the window was when the diversity of the day really began to set in. 

As I looked up into the store from my car, what did I see on the wall, but a huge LGBTQ Pride flag. Right then and there I knew it was nice to be wanted in a diverse situation. Especially, in today's world. 

The party tomorrow should be another comfortable diverse situation. It is a birthday party for a transgender woman friend at a big Italian restaurant in a nearby suburb of Cincinnati. To my knowledge, this is the first big outing of my friend's recovery from a fairly major stroke. 

If I don't get lost getting there, I will let you know how the party went for my transgender friend.