Oremus letter: Wise advice
When I was a young lad I was given some very valuable advice by a relative who had seen and experienced most of our nation’s ups and downs since before the time of the Great Depression of 1929, (he was born in 1914, passed on in 1988). It holds just as true today as it had when I first heard it when I was all of about 4 or 5.
“No matter where you are, who you are with or what you are doing in life, everyone around you has the right to be wrong, including you.”
Over the many years since, when I found myself in disagreement over any manner imaginable with someone else, those words would come back to me either during or after the event. I may not have always paused, given the situation at hand a little more thought and reapproached the matter from a different direction — hey, we are not all perfect — but it has sustained me over the years. I still have hope, even if everyone else is still wrong, because I may still be wrong myself.
Donald Oremus, Nampa
This story was originally published December 11, 2015 at 4:29 PM with the headline "Oremus letter: Wise advice."